STOLEN SISTERS: THE STORY OF TWO MISSING GIRLS, THEIR FAMILIES, AND HOW CANADA HAS FAILED INDIGENOUS WOMEN

STOLEN SISTERS: THE STORY OF TWO MISSING GIRLS, THEIR FAMILIES, AND HOW CANADA HAS FAILED INDIGENOUS WOMEN Emmanuelle Walter Toronto: Harper Collins, 2015

In Stolen Sisters: The Story of Two Missing Girls, Their Families, and How Canada Has Failed Indigenous Women, Walker explores the disappearance of Maisy Odjick and Shannon Alexander as a window into the Canada-wide crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women. She identifies colonialism and anti-Indigenous racism as underlying causes, and suggests that a feminicide is taking place, "a twofold phenomenon whereby countless women are murdered solely because of their gender, and government negligence further exacerbates the impact" (15). Overarchingly, she investigates the disproportionate and unique ways that violence against women manifests in Indigenous communities and among Indigenous women throughout Canada.

Since 1980, over 1,200 Indigenous women have gone missing or been murdered in Canada. Walker pays homage to them throughout Stolen Sisters. She assesses how anti-Indigenous racism is entrenched in Canadian society, including the police and government, and cites it as the primary reason why Indigenous women are disproportionately likely to go missing or be murdered, and to have their cases go unsolved. Although only 4.3 percent ofall women in Canada are Indigenous, they represent approximately 25 percent of all cases ofmissing or murdered women (Pearce as cited in Walker, 2015). In 2012, 23 percent offemale homicide victims were Indigenous women.

Walker overviews Canada's colonial history to contextualize the discrimination that Indigenous communities continue to face. She documents how settlers murdered Indigenous people in cold blood, including over 4,000 children via residential schools. Those who survived the genocide were deemed second-class citizens, and the social and political marginalization borne of this time continue to be felt today. Indigenous communities experience health disparities comparable to "third-world" countries, in addition to severely limited employment and education opportunities. Walker argues that the Canadian government is complicit in this marginalization and directly discriminates against Indigenous communities.

Stolen Sisters also aims to commemorate Maisy and Shannon. Maisy lived on the Algonquin reserve of Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg (KZA), which sits just outside Maniwaki, the Quebec town where Shannon resided. In September 2008, the girls went missing. Police and the media victim-blamed them for supposedly living "at-risk lifestyles," and blamed their families for supposedly failing to protect them....