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Book: “Sisters in the Wind” by Angeline Boulley
Publishing Info: Henry Holt & Co., September 2025
Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from NetGalley
Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound
Book Description: From the instant New York Times bestselling author of Firekeeper’s Daughter and Warrior Girl Unearthed comes a daring new mystery about a foster teen claiming her heritage on her own terms.
Ever since Lucy Smith’s father died five years ago, “home” has been more of an idea than a place. She knows being on the run is better than anything waiting for her as a “ward of the state.” But when the sharp-eyed and kind Mr. Jameson with an interest in her case comes looking for her, Lucy wonders if hiding from her past will ever truly keep her safe.
Five years in the foster system has taught her to be cautious and smart. But she wants to believe Mr. Jameson and his “friend-not-friend,” a tall and fierce-looking woman who say they want to look after her.
They also tell Lucy the truth her father hid from her: She is Ojibwe; she has – had – a sister, and more siblings; a grandmother who’d look after her and a home where she would be loved.
But Lucy is being followed. The past has destroyed any chance of normal she has had, and now the secrets she’s hiding will swallow her whole and take away the future she always dreamed of.
Review: Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this novel!
I was so elated when I saw that Angeline Boulley had a new YA novel coming out this year! I saw a big poster for it at ALAAC25 and it made my day (sadly I wasn’t able to attend her talk this year, but if she comes back she will get priority). I finally sat down to read “Sisters in the Wind” a few months later, and I went in with very high hopes. I’ve so enjoyed her other YA thrillers, and I was hoping for another winner. And I got it.
Like Boulley’s other YA novels, “Sisters in the Wind” tackles some pretty heavy societal issues to go along with the thriller and mystery elements in this story. In this book, the mystery is less about her main character, Lucy, solving a whodunnit, and more about the reader starting to untangle Lucy’s secrets and her difficult and traumatic past as a foster child who has been dealing with the foster care system since her father’s death. To make matters for difficult, her identity as an Indigenous person (as her mother was Indigenous and her father left her mother and took Lucy with him when she was a baby) has been suppressed her entire life, which cuts her off not only from her culture but from a family that is shocked to find her once they finally do. Boulley is so good at presenting difficult topics about racism and oppression of Indigenous people in this country to her audience, dismantling dark histories and white supremacy and showing how it reverberates and harms people. The big topic in this book is the Indian Child Welfare Act and how Lucy’s situation was lost through the cracks, and also puts a focus on the foster system and how corrupt and traumatic it can be. We don’t know what exactly happened to Lucy when the story starts, just that she’s on the run and someone wants to kill her, but as we go through her history we find a girl failed by so many finding her way back to a community that was taken from her. I know that some people have said that they found this endless tragedy to be unrealistic, but I don’t agree because Lucy’s story isn’t exactly unique to real world experiences, whether it’s racism, sexual abuse, coercion and manipulation, or even human trafficking. It’s a hard read, but it’s, sadly, still relevant.
We also have a welcome return to Sugar Island and familiar faces, characters, and the return of one who was missing in “Warrior Girl Unearthed”. In the timeline “Sisters in the Wind” takes place after “Firekeeper’s Daughter”, but before “Warrior Girl Unearthed”, and we find Lucy meeting a Daunis who exists between the scrappy teen in the first book and the grounded and nurturing mentor in the second book. I really enjoyed how Boulley gave us some more insight into Daunis and her trajectory, including more insight into her relationship with Jamie from the first novel, and I thought that she worked it in better in this one than the previous one. But I also appreciated that the presence of Daunis and Jamie and their connection to Lucy didn’t overshadow Lucy’s story or characterization, and if anything it made her family connections and her journey to the home she never knew feel all the more poignant and powerful. It also filled in some gaps and questions that were in place once we got to “Warrior Girl Unearthed” regarding how some of these characters got to the point they were at in the time jump, some of it incredibly satisfying, some of it devastating (but still satisfying? Just trust me). I really hope we get more stories from Sugar Island and the characters who live in the pages of these books.
“Sisters in the Wind” is another impactful and emotional thriller from Angeline Boulley. It had me running a full gamut of feelings, with difficult subject matter but an ever present thread of hope and love moving throughout the narrative. Good golly I love these books.
Rating 9: Another emotional and important book about Indigenous life in America from Angeline Boulley, with a compelling mystery, familiar faces, and some moments of heartbreak, hope, and coming home.
Reader’s Advisory:
“Sisters in the Wind” is included on the Goodreads lists “Native American Lit”, and “ATY 2026: Indigenous Character or Author”.
The Library Ladies 