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Book Review of The Birchbark House

The Birchbark House
LibraryEm42 avatar reviewed on + 26 more book reviews


This is a lovely children's book. It follows 7-year-old Ojibwe girl Omakayas and her family through a year (1847, I think). Some reviews have compared it to Little House on the Prairie (but from the Native perspective), and it does have some similarities: mainly, the combination of watching the family go through both normal activities like setting up their summer home, dealing with sibling tensions, picking berries, and raising a pet crow, and major events like a smallpox outbreak.

I haven't read the sequels, The Game of Silence and The Porcupine Year, yet, but if they're anything like this one, I'd recommend them all.