Seven Fallen Feathers Chapter Summary

Seven Fallen Feathers Book Review
Racism is a problem that has plagued Indigenous people since colonization. Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City by Tanya Talaga is a non-fiction book covering the tragic deaths of seven Indigenous high school students in Thunder Bay, Canada. Talaga covers the crisis that took place in Northern Ontario between 2000-2011 and how it relates to the big picture problem that is historical mistreatment and ongoing neglect towards Indigenous communities. The author is an award winning Canadian journalist and author, having mixed Indigenous and Polish heritage, she concentrates much of her work on Indigenous people and problems in Canada. This book is an important read for any Canadian

Talaga begins with a brief history of the area of Thunder Bay to help the reader understand the setting of the book, where she describes the region as a once thriving gathering and trading place for Indigenous people that developed into the racially divided city presently there today. Talaga (2017) states that “Thunder Bay has always been a city with two faces. The Port Arthur side is the white face and the Fort William side is the red face.” (p. 3), and she illustrates the clear separation between the Indigenous and white people and details the disparity of living conditions. Talaga continues by giving an individual look into each of the students’ lives and the events that led up to their disappearances, allowing the reader to get to know the youth on a more personal level before analyzing the group as a whole. Inequity between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people is highlighted throughout the book, where Talaga describes the discrimination that happened to the youth before and after death as well as the historical mistreatment of Indigenous people in Canada. The deaths of the youth spawned an inquest and led to numerous recommendations to ensure the safety of Indigenous students in the future, but many problems still exist and Talaga draws parallels in the book

While telling the story of each of the seven deceased, there was a sense of repetitiveness from that carried from one story to the next. For instance, each story had a predictable ending which focused around the inequity and racism that the students and their families experienced from the coroner and justice system leaving the book feeling very linear at times. Another issue with the writing style was that it sometimes difficult to follow. When telling the stories of the students, occasionally Talaga adds in historical information or statistics and then continues with the story. This style of writing provides background information to the story but sometimes felt clunky, disconnecting some ideas and may require rereading to understand the story. In particular, the chapter about Paul Panacheese begins with a brief history of where he grew up and his family, from the perspective of Maryanne Panacheese. We are briefly introduced to Paul and learn that he was an artist, Talaga (2017) states that “Paul’s art also hangs on the wall” (p. 159), before the author tells us the story of Maryanne’s childhood and how her sister went missing and Talaga (2017) states she “has a secret fear that Sarah was a victim of notorious serial killer Robert Pickton” (p. 162), Talaga then writes about the Robert Pickton connection and