Angeline Boulley’s critically acclaimed novel, Firekeeper's Daughter starts out with most of the things the average teenager is concerned with: dating, friendships, school, sports, and family relationships. The tone of the book switches about a quarter of the way through with a gunshot that takes away Daunis’ closest friend and the innocence of her small community.
A child of two worlds, Daunis Fontaine is the child of a French-Canadian mother and her late Ojibwe father. Though close to her paternal family, she is not fully a part of the Ojibwe nation. After the death of her friend Lily, Daunis becomes aware of illegal drug production and distribution tied to the nearby reservation. Asked to become a confidential informant because of her access to the reservation and aptitude for science, Daunis joins an undercover agent posing as a player on the local hockey team. What follows will test Daunis and the ties that bind her to her family, the Ojibwe, her hockey teammates and friends, and loved ones who have passed away but still deeply affect the 18-year-old girl.
A member of the Ojibwe nation which Daunis and other characters exist in, Angeline Boulley infuses Firekeeper’s Daughter with the lore and customs of her people. Boulley based her novel on events from her own adolescence and describes its young protagonist as the indigenous Nancy Drew. Fans of the book will be glad to know Netflix has begun development on a dramatized version of the story. In the meantime, try Boulley’s follow-up novel Warrior Girl Unearthed which continues the story of the Firekeeper family and these other books with similar themes to Boulley’s fictional works about indigenous peoples.
Perry Firekeeper-Birch has always known who she is, the laid-back twin, the troublemaker, and the best fisher on Sugar Island. Her aspirations won't ever take her far from home, and she wouldn't have it any other way. But as the already striking number of missing Indigenous women continues to rise, as her family becomes embroiled in a high-profile murder investigation, and as greedy grave robbers seek to profit off what belongs to her Anishinaabe tribe, Perry begins to question everything. In order to reclaim this inheritance for her people, Perry has no choice but to take matters into her own hands. She can only count on her friends and allies, including her overreaching twin and a charming new boy in town with unwavering morals. Old rivalries, sister secrets, and botched heists cannot and will not stop her from uncovering the mystery before the ancestors and missing women are lost forever.
Nina is a Lipan girl in our world. She's always felt there was something more out there. She still believes in the old stories. Oli is a cottonmouth kid, from the land of spirits and monsters. Like all cottonmouths, he's been cast from home. He's found a new one on the banks of the bottomless lake. Nina and Oli have no idea the other exists. But a catastrophic event on Earth, and a strange sickness that befalls Oli's best friend, will drive their worlds together in ways they haven't been in centuries. And some will kill to keep them apart.
In 1980 life is hard on the Tuscarora Reservation in upstate New York, and most of the teenagers feel like they are going nowhere: Carson Mastick dreams of forming a rock band, and Maggi Bokoni longs to create her own conceptual artwork instead of the traditional beadwork that her family sells to tourists--but tensions are rising between the reservation and the surrounding communities, and somehow in the confusion of politics and growing up Carson and Maggi have to make a place for themselves.
Meet teenage Wiccan Mila Flores, who truly could not care less what you think about her Doc Martens, her attitude, or her weight because she knows that, no matter what, her BFF Riley is right by her side. When Riley and Fairmont Academy mean girls June Phelan-Park and Dayton Nesseth die under suspicious circumstances, Mila refuses to believe everyone's explanation that her BFF was involved in a suicide pact. Instead, armed with a tube of lip gloss and an ancient grimoire, Mila does the unthinkable to uncover the truth: she brings the girls back to life. Unfortunately, Riley, June, and Dayton have no recollection of their murders. But they do have unfinished business to attend to. Now, with only seven days until the spell wears off and the girls return to their graves, Mila must wrangle the distracted group of undead teens and work fast to discover their murderer...before the killer strikes again.
Told in two voices, Pen, whose dream of taking over her family's restaurant has been destroyed, and Xander, a new, undocumented, employee seeking his father, form a bond. As an aspiring pastry chef, Penelope Prado has always dreamed of opening her own pastelería next to her father's restaurant, Nacho's Tacos. But her traditional Mexican-American mom and dad have different plans. Xander Amaro Is a new hire at Nacho's. For him, the job is an opportunity for a chance at a normal life, to settle in at his abuelo's, and to find the father who left him behind. When both the restaurant and Xander's immigrant status are threatened, he will do whatever it takes to protect his new-found family and himself.
Pulga has his dreams, Chico has his grief, Pequeña has her pride, and these three teens have one another. But none of them have illusions about the town they've grown up in and the dangers that surround them. Even with the love of family, threats lurk around every corner. And when those threats become all too real, the trio knows they have no choice but to run: from their country, from their families, from their beloved home. Crossing from Guatemala through Mexico, they follow the route of La Bestia, the perilous train system that might deliver them to a better life, if they are lucky enough to survive the journey. With nothing but the bags on their backs and desperation drumming through their hearts, Pulga, Chico, and Pequeña know there is no turning back, despite the unknown that awaits them. And the darkness that seems to follow wherever they go.
Camino Rios lives for the summers when her father visits her in the Dominican Republic. But this time, on the day when his plane is supposed to land, Camino arrives at the airport to see crowds of crying people. In New York City, Yahaira Rios is called to the principal's office, where her mother is waiting to tell her that her father, her hero, has died in a plane crash. Separated by distance, and Papi's secrets, the two girls are forced to face a new reality in which their father is dead and their lives are forever altered. And then, when it seems like they've lost everything of their father, they learn of each other.
