The Marrow Thieves Literary Elements

Young Adult, Science Fiction, Speculative climate fiction

A dystopian future world destroyed by climate change

Frenchie, first-person point of view

The tone of the novel is dark and apocalyptic. The mood is at turns devastating, tragic, hopeful, and inspiring.

Frenchie is the protagonist, while the Recruiters and their allies are the antagonists.

The novel's major conflict is the struggle between Miig's group of Indigenous resistance members who are trying to preserve not only their lives, but their way of life, and the white Recruiters, who are trying to steal the capacity to dream, which white society has lost, from the Indigenous people who still have it.

The climax of the novel occurs when Minerva dies during the group's effort to rescue her. Miig's group and the members of the resistance camp placed great hope in Minerva as the "key" to bringing down the Recruiters' marrow-harvesting system. They hoped that by rescuing her from the Recruiters' convoy, they would be able to put an end to the Recruiters' system. But this hope is quickly dashed when a driver shoots Minerva, who dies in Miig's and Rose's arms. This climax also sets the stage for the novel's hopeful ending. While the group loses Minerva, they eventually witness another dramatic reunion with someone who dreams in an Indigenous language: Isaac.

Dimaline foreshadows RiRi’s tragic death by highlighting how Travis and Lincoln are suspicious and untrustworthy, as well as Lincoln’s unsettling comment to the women that they will be safer if they stay closeby. The author also foreshadows the way RiRi dies by dramatically describing the six-story drop from the cliff near their campsite.

French's father, Jean, uses an understatement when he tells his son, "Boy, I could get used to hearing DAD again, let me tell you." The reunion between father and son is so unexpected and emotional that Jean must take time to process it, and he finds himself at a loss for words.

Throughout The Marrow Thieves, Dimaline refers to the traumatic and very real history of the Indian residential school system in Canada. The Canadian and United States colonial governments created these schools during the 1800s as a means of “kill[ing] the Indian in the child.” The schools were administered by churches. They forcibly tore children from their families and prohibited them from speaking their languages or practicing their cultural traditions. Physical and sexual abuse were common.

The image of darkness consuming the world prevails throughout the novel.

Throughout the novel, Dimaline characterizes Minerva as a quiet, eccentric, and somewhat broken character who hardly speaks. Paradoxically, she is the character who takes the war against the Recruiters farthest. Moreover, she does so by speaking her language and singing a song.

Dimaline uses similar language and tone to suggest a parallel between two critical moments in which Frenchie draws his rifle. In the first instance, he encounters a moose. He feels time slow down such that he’s able to take aim. But in the end, he chooses not to kill the animal, so as not to take its life wastefully. In the second instance, devastated by the death of RiRi, Frenchie ponders whether or not to kill Travis. He feels time slow down and is again able to take aim. This time he does pull the trigger, killing this person who handed Wab over to a gang, killed his adopted little sister, and is likely to keep turning over Native people to Recruiters.

French dreams of the Recruiters taking his brother. The dream is so vivid that he feels its fingers grasp his lower back, even after he wakes up. Dimaline personifies dreams in order to demonstrate the very real power they exert in the novel.