This is basically: Residential Schools: The Sequel. It turns out Indigenous kids are still dying because of unequal access to education, among other inequities. Talaga looks at the deaths of seven students in Thunder Bay, Ontario, in particular, but draws a much wider picture of all the general causes, tracing a red line from the residential school system to the present day problems.

I think a lot of Canadians want to pretend that now that the residential schools are over, and some vague nod to reparations have been made, that everything will be fine now, even though report after report has come out, starting in the 1930s and running up to today talking about how broken the current education system is. The ninety-four recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission haven't been implemented, and until they are, kids are going to keep dying. I thought Talaga did a really good job of following individual lives and families to honour the lives lost while never losing the perspective of this being a national problem.

I think one of the most striking things for me was how many of the kids spoke Anishinaabemowin as their first language, yet had basically no schooling options in that language. (TRC recommendations 10 and 16 cover this.) But that's basically one example. I think you could go through the whole book side by side with the TRC and see how each recommendation impacts real lives.

Really solid read, would rec to anyone who wants to know more about what's going on with the post-residential school education system.