The Marrow Thieves

Cherie Dimaline

May 2017 · DCB

About this ebook

Just when you think you have nothing left to lose, they come for your dreams.

Humanity has nearly destroyed its world through global warming, but now an even greater evil lurks. The indigenous people of North America are being hunted and harvested for their bone marrow, which carries the key to recovering something the rest of the population has lost: the ability to dream. In this dark world, Frenchie and his companions struggle to survive as they make their way up north to the old lands. For now, survival means staying hidden — but what they don't know is that one of them holds the secret to defeating the marrow thieves.

Ratings and reviews

One of the worst books I have ever read as an assignment for my school. This book was assigned for us in English class to read and my God, it's painful trying to finish it. The bone marrows containing dreams just makes no sense other than some stupid symbolism, the characters just feel so dry, the environment around is so confusing to visualize, so many unnecessary specified details and words, the pacing is weird and the literal weird romanticism of two minors. I'm just so happy I was able to endure enough to nearly finish reading the book. If only I had the time, I would even try reading it again and make a much more detailed review but I doubt itm

This book is god awful, I had to read it for my Grade 9 socials studies class and after reading the back there were 2 red flags for me immediately. 1: All of the quotes on the back praising the book could easily be taken out of context and pasted on another book. 2: The summary on the back presents it as a teen dystopian with a stereo typical plot. After reading it though that's when I discovered how bad the book actually is. So lets address the elephant in the room, the bone marrow. Number 1 there's no reason for it to be linked to dreams and for it to be linked to Native Americans, and it's basically a McGuffin that the story uses and never elaborates on other than just "yeah the bone marrow makes people dream for some reason. Number 2 why are people not using non lethal ways of extracting bone marrow? It's the future and they should have ways of doing that better are better than just "throw them into the grinder". The characters overall are bland and are stereotyped so easily, and the villains are cookie cutter a typical bad guys that have no personality and have no motive over than just being evil. Overall this story is awful avoid the book at all costs

This book gave me stage 5 cancer. CP, plot holes, overused idea of SA, racist, sexist, and overall the worst book I've ever read. It had potential, but the author decided to throw the character development opportunity away and instead make the main characters make out.

About the author

Cherie Dimaline is a Métis author and editor whose award-winning fiction has been published and anthologized internationally. Her first book, Red Rooms, was published in 2007, and her novel The Girl Who Grew a Galaxy was released in 2013. In 2014, she was named the Emerging Artist of the Year at the Ontario Premier’s Award for Excellence in the Arts, and became the first Aboriginal Writer in Residence for the Toronto Public Library. Her young adult novel, The Marrow Thieves, has won the Governor General’s Literary Award and the Kirkus Prize; it was a finalist for the White Pine Award, was named to the Globe and Mail Top 100 and was selected for CBC’s Canada Reads.