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katetracy's review
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.5
Diane Wilson beautifully weaves together four women’s stories about a tragic past and the ramifications that are still felt today. A must read to start to attempt to understand the deep pain felt in the indigenous community following the separation of families in the 1900’s and the current chemical plague on native lands all for the sake of some exec’s bottom line.
I especially liked the moments when Rosalie would be in her garden and enjoyed witnessing her connection to nature.
I especially liked the moments when Rosalie would be in her garden and enjoyed witnessing her connection to nature.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Abandonment, Colonisation, and Death of parent
Minor: Suicide, Drug abuse, Physical abuse, and Alcoholism
mefrias's review
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
An incredibly harrowing but immensely important story told across generations. A catalyst to learn more about issues affecting Native American and specifically Dakhóta peoples today, which are rooted in settler colonization, genocide and forced separation from their land and families.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Forced institutionalization, Colonisation, Death, Domestic abuse, Suicide, Death of parent, Addiction, Alcoholism, Suicidal thoughts, Abandonment, Mental illness, Racism, Self harm, Child abuse, Child death, and Drug abuse
telemesmerism's review
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Terminal illness, Racial slurs, Animal death, Child abuse, Colonisation, Death of parent, and Racism
Moderate: Suicide, Alcoholism, Domestic abuse, Bullying, and Drug abuse
librar_bee's review
challenging
emotional
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
An emotional narrative that spans multiple generations and perspectives, <i>The Seed Keeper</i> is a beautiful story that solemnly reminds us of the true caretakers of the North American continent and their legacy. Through Rosalie and Gaby, the two female protagonists, we learn how two Indigenous women devote their lives to fierce advocacy for a healthy relationship between humans and the land in very different ways.
This novel deals with complex emotions among the characters and develops them until they feel vivid. Wilson's writing paints a lovely picture and I found it nearly impossible to put this book down and break the images her words built in my head. Highly recommend for folks looking to read more Indigenous fiction and understand more about the role of humans in the natural order.
This novel deals with complex emotions among the characters and develops them until they feel vivid. Wilson's writing paints a lovely picture and I found it nearly impossible to put this book down and break the images her words built in my head. Highly recommend for folks looking to read more Indigenous fiction and understand more about the role of humans in the natural order.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse and Emotional abuse
Minor: Drug use and Drug abuse
bedtimesandbooks's review
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Child abuse, Rape, Racism, Racial slurs, Cultural appropriation, Addiction, Alcohol, Bullying, Colonisation, Death of parent, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Genocide, Grief, Murder, Sexual assault, and Suicide
anishinaabekwereads's review
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
“I studied the patience of the red oak so perfectly formed over many years, as she endured the cold. In the fall, she prepared by pulling the energy of sunlight belowground, to be stored in her roots, much as I preserved the harvest from my garden. Through a season that seems too cold for anything to survive, the tree simply waits, still growing inside, and dreams of spring. Without fully understanding yet why I had come back, I began to think it was for this, for the slow return of a language I once knew. The language of this place.”
Diane Wilson’s The Seed Keeper is honestly one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever read. Filled with loving descriptions of prairie lands, of woods, of rivers, of gardens growing in a midwestern summer, I felt the call of that landscape. I could envision the heat, the power of storms, the coldness of a winter in what is now that state of Minnesota. I need to say from the outset, that I am not Dakhota. The history in this book is not my history. Even histories of boarding schools vary between Dakhota and Ojibwe people because we were not exiled from our homes. Still, this book felt like a call to those parts of me that still need to heal from trauma inflicted through colonialism. I love this book with my whole heart.
Following a nonlinear (though sometimes quite linear) timeline, we follow Roaslie Iron Wing, a Dakhota woman who is reeling from compounded loss. She was taken from her family and community as a child, raised in a foster home where she felt alone and unwanted, left to fend for herself and find a way to survive a world that holds onto anti-Indigenous hostility. Important to this story is how her family survived the US-Dakhota War of 1862 and boarding schools, though not without the scars of intergenerational trauma.
We see Rosalie return home to her family’s land and we watch as she rebuilds connections to a family she didn’t know had sought her out for years and to a community she didn’t feel she belonged to. This story is also about rebuilding and protecting Dakhota connections to lands, to trees, waters, and plants. It’s a novel about coming home, about healing even if the path isn’t entirely clear.
The most stunning parts of this novel demonstrate the intimacy and love Dakhota women have with seeds that sustain their families and Dakhota culture. Wilson beautifully demonstrates how important seeds are to everything else, how caring for seeds and the earth they grow in is a practiced act of survival for Indigenous peoples as evidenced through the protection of such seeds themselves.
I was at a talk Wilson gave a couple of years ago and she talked about this book, about how there were these stories of Dakhota women carrying their seeds with them to Fort Snelling where they were incarcerated after the US-Dakhota War and to Crow Creek and Santee after Dakhota people were legally and physically exiled from their homelands. She talked about how Dakhota women would sew seeds into the hems of their skirts. It was at that moment I knew this book was going to be such an essential literary contribution. Dakhota history is not easy and Wilson reminds of this consistently, but there is strength and beauty and love in Dakhota survival.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Cancer, Grief, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Terminal illness
Moderate: Addiction, Child abuse, Child death, Death of parent, and Drug abuse
Minor: Rape
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