National Network for Equitable Library Service

Life stories of two Métis sisters who suffer the breakdown of family relations and the injustices of the social services system. Culleton has made April Raintree the spokesperson for the Métis. April and her younger sister Cheryl, when only six and four years old, were taken from their parents by the Children's Aid Society, first to a convent orphanage, and then to various foster homes. Even though often separated, they always thought about and wrote to each other. April was the white Métis, while Cheryl was totally Indian in appearance. Both children excelled in school, but while April dreamed of integrating into the white society, Cheryl dreamed of becoming a social worker finding her parents, rebuilding the family, and eventually helping children like herself. Perhaps because of the immediacy of the first-person narrative, the reader is inevitably drawn into the controversy regarding attitudinal ethics and the question of foster homes and adoption of native children. April Raintree is an important addition to the supplementary reading list for native studies, Canadian family, and people in society courses, as well as thematic units in Canadian literature. Based on the adult novel In Search of April Raintree, April Raintree has been revised specifically for students in grades 9 through 12. The first edition of April Raintree, published in 1984, has since touched many generations of readers, becoming a Canadian school classic.