In Red River Rose, an engrossing and harrowing work of historical fiction, Carole Lindstrom offers a First Nations response to the romanticization of the pioneer spirit celebrated in tales of 19th-century western expansion.
Twelve-year-old Rose loves her way of life in Batoche, "a small Métis community in the Northwest Territories" of Canada. Rose spends her time trapping, hunting, playing, and gathering medicinal herbs on the banks of the South Saskatchewan River. When rumors start circulating about the Canadian government planning to divide and distribute their land to more settlers coming from the east, it becomes clear the Métis are going to resist. Rose wants to fight with her community, but as a girl she is expected to help her ma with childcare in their safe house away from the fighting. Nonetheless, her heroic cleverness and bravery contribute to her community holding their own--at least for a little while--against the North West Mounted Police soldiers during what became known as the North-West Resistance.
Lindstrom writes from the viewpoint of her own Métis and First Nation ancestors who fought in the Saskatchewan North-West Resistance of 1885, calling this fictionalized account "my Little House on the Prairie." Rose and Laura Ingalls share a keen sense of justice, and both their families work hard to make a happy life for themselves, but there is a hole in the Little House books that Lindstrom fills: the perspective of all the people the settlers often violently displaced from their homes. Like Linda Sue Park's Prairie Lotus and the Show Me a Sign series by Ann Clare LeZotte, Red River Rose thrills, provokes, and disquiets. --Emilie Coulter, freelance writer and editor