The Marrow Thieves 
Themes
Setting
Dreams
Post-apocalyptic world
Residential schools
Author
Indigenous populations
Bone marrow, "recruiters" take the marrow in the indigenous people bones because they've lost the ability to dream and they think they can restore them by using their marrow.
Keeping their culture alive by sharing their stories and native languages
Separating Indigenous children from their families and their cultures. Assimilating them to Canadian culture. Banned from speaking their language and practicing their spiritual beliefs
Characters
Frenchie (16 years old boy)
Protagonist of the novel
Travelling family
Miig
Rose
Family
Mitch (brother), he has bronchitis, blue eyes, dark hair and his teeths are crooked
Minerva
Riri
Recruiters
Sea levels have risen
oil pipelines have poisoned freshwater sources
Warm temperature
Earthquackes
Cherie Dimaline
Member of the Georgian Bay Métis community in Ontario
Ethnic group from the First Nations Indigenous people
Learned the traditional Métis stories in Métis community during summer
Lives in Toronto with her husband and her dog
Founding editor of Muskrat Magazine
Involved in residency programs at the Toronto Public Library
Lost his mother and father, scarred by their abscence.
Father figure of the group of Indigenous children
Wab
Oldest girl. Choose who does what domestic tasks, rape survivor
Elder of Miig's family
Isaac
Chi-Boy
Miig's husband
Zheegwon/Tree
Slopper
Resistance group council
Anishnaabe people
Tells the Story, "Dreams get caught in the webs woven in your bones. That's where they live, in the marrow there." He's very direct and he speaks in a forthright manner.
Attached to Frenchie
Human antagonist, captures Indigenous people and keep the prisoners in residential schools and they extract their marrow to acquire their dreams.
The schools in the book are a symbol of Canada's history when they had to give up their culture by assimilating and sometimes killing the Indigenous people
Survival
p.54 "us and the recruiters are motivated by the same thing, survival."
When Frenchie's brother sacrificed himself so that he wouldn't get taken away by the recruiters.
They're always on the run, trying to escape the recruiters that are hunting them down for their bone marrow.
The bush
Undevelopped canadian forests that contains many parasites and are known to be freezing and very dark at night.
It helped Frenchie and his group to hide from the recruiters because of their high concentration of tall trees. It provided them with great camouflage.
Conflicts
Person VS nature
Frenchie and his group VS the bush: During their journey, they had to survive through very difficult weather conditions, like rain and snowstorms. The forest made it difficult to find food and to hunt... They had to stick together to be able to survive.
During the book, he'll become more proud and have more dignity on being an Indigenous boy.
She burned down the residential schools by singing when they tried to extract her bone marrow
Always been curious and wanting to hear the Story, but she was too young, and when she finally heard it, she got scared of strangers and she became more dark and found a lot of things scary. She used to be always happy...
Frenchie has a crush on her, and throughout their journey, she starts to like him too.
Frenchie thinks that he might be the solution to destroying the residential schools.
He's the "patroler" because he's good at sneaking through the forest. He's in love with Wab and he's always trying to protect her. He teachs her how to hunt and it allows them to spend time together.
Their twins and are extremely close. They're almost the same person. The suffered a lot when they were captured and taken away for their bone marrow but they were after released.
After Minerva's death, the Council put him in charge of forming a youth council so that he can pass on their cultural knowledge.