Julie Book

I was OBSESSED with the first book in this series as a kid, but somehow I had NO idea there were follow up books? I really don't know how I missed that, but here I am reading this for the first time at 27 years old and I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it.

I know as a kid, I would have liked this book - especially the portion that actually had the wolves in it. But as an adult, I'm looking at this through the eyes of someone who is very leery about white authors putting words in native folks' mouths. The relationship between Ellen and Julie was really touching, but parts of the book felt very stereotypical. I wasn't sure how to feel about Julie trying to "save her father from the white man's ways" and coax her village back into a healthy relationship with nature. That just seems very trope-y and I'm worried about the inaccuracies that I learned were so baked into the first book.

All in all, it's a good story about reconciliation between cultures and between family members with some fun talking to wolves. But I'm just nervous about hearing these simplified stories from white authors. I'd love to hear from any goodreads reviewers who are actually Inupiaq or Yupik and can speak to whether the story is respectful or not. Until then, I'll just kind of swim around in this tentative enjoyment and try to take everything with a grain of salt.