A review by donaghys1
Firekeeper's Daughter by Angeline Boulley

1.0

I DNF with less than 100 pages left. This book perfectly encapsulates the reason I normally avoid books that are in Oprah’s or Reese’s book clubs like the plague. The most popular and most advertised female-led books always seem to have sexual assualt for no good reason and frankly I am not interested in trauma porn. I was honestly enjoying this books for how easy it was to read but immediately put it down as soon as I knew what would happen at Shagala. It was frustrating for many reasons: 1. it served no purpose to the plot at all 2. it is one of many instances (though maybe the most important instance) where Daunis did the exact opposite of what I would have done in a situation. A perverted man she had already been afraid of and preyed on by says he has a video of her doing something she can easily explain away and requests that she come up to his hotel room “or else”? Why the fuck did she go with him? Whatever the consequences of snooping in this dude’s office would have been PALE in comparison to the alternative. 3. This poor girl already has so much trauma, most of which has accumulated in less than a year. She’s held at arm’s length by her own community and the rest of the world. Her father died, her uncle died, her grandmother is dying, her best friend is murdered in front of her, she witnesses her childhood friends’ deterioration from drugs then his graphic suicide, she found the dead body of a girl she grew up with, so many others in her community die, her mother isn’t a good support system, she’s body shamed constantly, her brother’s friends objectify her, she’s been lied to in relationships before and is now being actively manipulated. Why does she need more than that? Now there’s ANOTHER thing for her to process? No thank you. ALSO she’s supposed to have nerve damage in her shoulder and be unable to feel anything but she can feel pain? She can feel Jaime’s kiss on her shoulder? she’s supposed to be a pre med student and the author didn’t even bother to research nerve damage at all? Nah, Angeline, do better. Don’t read this book, friends.