64 pages • 2 hours read
Hunting by Stars
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 1-8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary: “Proof of Life”
Seventeen-year-old Francis “French” Dusome has been captured by Recruiters and taken to a former boarding school that has been converted into a sinister facility where the marrow of Native people is extracted. French is so named because of his Métis (Native and European settler) heritage. Concussed and confined to a dark, windowless cell, French dreams of his older brother, Mitch.
In the dream, Mitch and French are still children and are playing in a treehouse with a plastic figurine of an army man. French alerts Mitch that the Recruiters are coming for him. The dream segues to the post-apocalyptic reality of the world, which has been ruined by climate change and environmental degradation. Most non-Native people have been infected by a lethal plague that takes away their ability to dream, and thus, their sanity. The bone marrow of Native people is believed to cure the effects of the plague. Suddenly, infected people begin to pounce on French and Mitch, who are healthy and full of marrow.
In the present, French screams and wakes up. He notices that his cell is pitch-dark. French misses his found family, the group with whom he lives and travels. He consoles himself that at least he is not yet dead, and cries unexpectedly for his biological mother, who left him and Mitch a long time ago. French faints again.
Chapter 2 Summary: “Losing the Finder”
Hours after French is captured, the members of the family huddle around a fire in a nearby forest, wondering how he could have been lost. Miigwans (Miig), the Elder of the group, blames himself for not noticing sooner that French was missing. Miig believes that he was distracted by his relief at reuniting with his husband Isaac, who was lost in the residential schools for years. He reflects on the bitter irony that French was the one who found Isaac in the first place. Wab, a heavily pregnant young woman whom French loves like an older sister, and her partner Chi Boy, also worry about French. Wab is missing an eye and is heavily scarred from her traumatic childhood. Fierce and courageous Rose, who is 16 and French’s girlfriend, wants to act immediately and rescue him. When the others suggest waiting to formalize a rescue a plan, Rose storms off angrily to the edge of the woods. Derrick, a relatively new entrant to the group, follows Rose and advises her against acting rashly, since impulsiveness is what makes people like them get caught. Rose believes that Derrick is referring to their failed rescue of the Elder Minerva. (In Marrow Thieves, Minerva is the Elder of Miig’s group and a repository of Cree language. When the family tries hurriedly to rescue a captured Minerva, a Recruiter shoots and kills her.) Now, Rose agrees to wait for the time being. Derrick comforts Rose, privately noting that French’s departure may not be a bad thing for him, as he is also in love with Rose.
Chapter 3 Summary: “Prison”
In his cell, French recalls a memory of his family sitting in a circle by a fire. In the memory, Tree and Zheegwon, identical twins, keep watch, while Slopper, the baby of the group, who is physically a giant, slouches next to Rose’s feet. It is Story Time. Miigwans says that Story is a space, a home that accommodates all people, even those who are vastly different from one another. Although they are all grouped under the category of “Dreamers” (22), they are made of separate nations and clans. The found family must keep adding to their story in order to tell their collective and separate histories. Miigwans recounts how climate change and a succession of plagues ravaged the planet. When people saw that the Dreamers could still dream and imagine, even after the plague, they came for the Dreamers’ marrow. Miigwans tells French that he must never let the others take his dreams.
In the present, French awakens and hobbles around, trying to find an exit. He hears his mother’s voice tell him that she is right behind him. French turns to a wall, reaches out his hand, and finds his mother’s hand. French knows that his mother is a hallucination, but over the next few days, he begins to look forward to her frequent visits. French also recalls the night he was captured. On that night, Isaac and Miigwans had just been reunited. French was sitting a little away from the others, crying with joy, when he heard a sound like a bullet hitting a tree. He fainted and woke up later in this room. Now, French worries that his marrow has already been taken and fears that he is losing his sanity. He falls asleep crying. He dreams that he is by a fire next to Rose’s charred skull. Although the dream is terrifying, it is proof that French’s marrow has not been yet taken, since without marrow, he could not dream.
The door to the room opens, and a man drags French through several industrial-looking hallways until they reach a room marked Meeting Room 3.
Chapter 4 Summary: “The Plan”
Miig’s family group has joined a larger group called the Council. Father Carole, who is ostensibly a director for the residential school system, is really Miig’s man on the inside. Now, Father Carole brings the Council important intelligence about recent Recruiter activity. Elders like Miig and French’s dad, Jean, sit at the main table with Carole, while Rose and the others observe the group from another table. (Jean was found by French and the others in The Marrow Thieves.) According to Carole, two regional schools in the vicinity have received four Native people in the past few days. The schools—St. Brebeuf and Sir John A. McDonald—are 80 miles away, and it is impossible to know which facility is holding French. When Rose interrupts angrily, Bullet, an Elder of the Council, asks all the younger people to leave. Rose tells Derrick that she is tired of doing nothing while French is in trouble. Derrick tries to dissuade her from acting rashly, but Rose declares that she is heading out anyway. Derrick decides to go with her.
Chapter 5 Summary: “Chi-Boy’s Coming-To Story”
Back in the tent that Chi-Boy shares with Wab, Chi-Boy tells his unborn baby his “coming-to story” (41), the tale of his origin and of how he came to meet Wab and the family. Chi-Boy remembers his life not as a movie, but as a series of scenes cobbled together. The scenes are from the various foster homes and group homes in which he grew up. In one scene, 11-year-old Chi Boy leaves the group home because children around him are going missing. With only a torn rucksack on his back, Chi Boy makes his way to the outskirts of the city, where there are farms. People chase Chi-Boy, calling him “a dream smuggler” (61). Chi-Boy comes to a farmhouse inhabited by an elderly couple and asks for help. To his shock, the man brings out a gun and shoots Chi-Boy in the leg, calling him racist epithets. Injured, Chi-Boy manages to find shelter in an abandoned trailer, where he meets Minerva, an Elder. Minerva and Chi-Boy travel together in the countryside, where they meet Miig and Wab. Chi-Boy immediately falls in love with Wab.
Chapter 6 Summary: “Catalog and Crucify”
In Meeting Room 3, French is made to sit across a desk from a man dressed in an oversized suit. French cannot see the man’s face very well but notes that he must be very young. When the young man asks French his name and other details, French does not answer him, instead asking about the facility in which he is imprisoned. The man dismisses French and sends him back to his cell for refusing to cooperate. French is terrified at the prospect of returning to the dark, solitary cell and tries to reason with the man. As French is escorted out of the meeting room, the light falls on his interviewer’s face, and French recognizes his long-lost brother Mitch, who has a limp that he did not have before.
As the guard takes French away, French wants to shout for Mitch but finds himself too weak to speak. French finally musters strength and breaks away from the guard, hoping to talk to his brother. French believes that if Mitch is at the facility, then their mother might be there as well. A group of guards tackle French to the ground.
Chapter 7 Summary: “Miles to Go”
Rose and Derrick leave the camp at first light. Derrick asks Rose to leave her tent and travel light. He is happy when she listens to his suggestion, as this means they will be sharing a tent. When they reach the main road after a few hours of walking, Rose decides to head toward the Sir John A. McDonald school. She tells Derrick that French is her family. Derrick fools himself into believing that Rose thinks of French as her brother. Derrick and Rose swap funny stories as they head in the direction of the school.
Chapter 8 Summary: “A Girl and a Gun”
Back at the camp, the family finds Derrick’s note, which states that he and Rose have taken a rifle and gone to find French. In the note, Derrick promises to bring Rose back safely. Bullet is angry at Rose, even though she likes and respects the girl for her fierceness and tenacity. Bullet and Wab confer, noting that Carole would have brought them intel about the school in a week. Rose has left with no idea of French’s whereabouts. The family members decide to rescue French the moment they get concrete information from Carole.
Chapters 1-8 Analysis
Throughout the novel, Dimaline invokes the patterns of oral storytelling conventions to enhance her world-building and provide much-needed exposition. By offering multiple perspectives, the author also takes an organic approach to introducing a variety of dynamic characters. As the characters recount their “coming-to” stories of how they came to be with their found family, these interwoven tales invoke a powerful image of a family sitting in a circle, keeping their traditions and beliefs alive. The importance of storytelling in keeping a family, community, and tradition together is further emphasized by Miig when he describes the concept of Story itself as an ever-growing home. “Story” is the tale of how the current world came to be. As more members join a family, their stories add more rooms to the metaphorical home, and the act of exchanging stories preserves and expands this continuity between people and across generations. Another feature of the narrative structure is that chapter titles are meaningful, often alluding to a symbol or a theme in the text, or foreshadowing an event. For instance, the title of Chapter 6, “Catalog and Crucify,” can be read as a critique of the injustices that European colonialists and Christian institutions have perpetrated upon Native people. Thus, the narrative implies that while non-Native white cultures lay an inordinate emphasis on cataloging people as if they were specimens—such as when Mitch relentlessly interrogates French—institutionalized Christianity has punished and killed them.
The Impact of Greed on Native People and the Environment is a prominent theme from the very beginning of the story. In the novel’s dystopian universe, colonial greed leads to history repeating itself in the form of institutionalized violence against the novel’s Native peoples, and historical residential schools have been repurposed as facilities to house Indigenous people for processing or marrow extraction. While marrow extraction is a literal practice in the world of the novel, it also serves as a metaphor for the real-world erasure of Indigenous peoples’ identities and languages. Historically, these residential schools were designed to make children forget their roots and their language, thus alienating them from their own cultures. By invoking this dark history in the narrative, Dimaline emphasizes the fact that such schools were oppressive and cruel, and this aspect of the setting is evident from the first chapter in which French wakes up in a dark, solitary cell. Furthermore, the novel also explores how such schools systematically dehumanize individuals. In Chapter 6, for example, French starts off as a bold teenager, rebelling against interrogation. However, by the end of the chapter, the threat of solitary confinement begins to break his spirit. This dynamic shows how profoundly torture and intimidation can undermine the confidence of even the most determined people. The wedge between French and his long-lost but idolized brother is a parallel to the ways in which residential school systems historically tore children away from their families, sometimes turning brother against brother through deliberate brainwashing.
French’s fear of the solitary cell is an important element, as the cell and other enclosed spaces are a key motif in the text, representing the confinement of the novel’s Indigenous peoples. The sterility and boxiness of the schools is often juxtaposed with the open spaces that the Native peoples inhabit, and the author uses immersive imagery to contrast the harsh, institutional world of the schools with that of the dangerous but vibrant wilderness. To this end, the descriptions of French’s cell and the hallways of the school evoke a sense of dread and claustrophobia. For example, when the Watchmen take French to the meeting room, French notes a smell like “wet metal and chalk […] the smell of industry, of more structure than flesh” (33). By creating a binary opposition between industry and nature, the author once again invokes the recurring theme of The Impact of Greed on Native People and the Environment. Additionally, these scenes refute the notion that homes and concrete structures are safe spaces, for throughout the novel, the most intense scenes of violence, oppression, and abuse take place in such buildings, while the campsites of the family blend into the natural landscapes and offer far more safety, despite being exposed to animals and the elements. In the context of the story, walls and boxes are also used as metaphors for colonial attempts to force the novel’s Native peoples to conform to the definitions of propriety of their non-Native counterparts.
While the holding facility emphasizes the many injustices of colonialism, the bonds uniting French with his family highlight The Importance of Hope in Bleak Times. Holed up in the school, French sustains himself with thoughts of his family, and he finds a sense of renewed strength when he imagines how Chi Boy or Tree or Zheegwon would respond in a similar situation. This habit implies that French is in constant mental communion with his found family. This communion represents hope and the drive to move forward. Significantly, while French’s found family is a source of hope, his biological brother Mitch represents a far more ambiguous reality. Even at this early stage, the narrative foreshadows that French and Mitch’s relationship will become darker than French could ever imagine.
One of the key features of Dimaline’s writing can be found in her realistic and clear-eyed depictions of violence. As Chi-Boy’s coming-to story shows, such violence is presented without any form of softening. Dimaline’s deliberate choice to eschew euphemism illustrates the depth of real-world crimes against Indigenous people, as well as the cruelty of which any human being is capable. The depictions of violence are also important to prepare youngsters for the world which they are inheriting, as Chi Boy tells his unborn baby. Implicit within this narrative style is the broader belief that occluding the truth will not help future generations, for in order to survive, they must know the truth, no matter how terrible it may seem.
Unlock all 64 pages of this Study GuidePlus, gain access to 8,800+ more expert-written Study Guides.
Including features:
Related Titles
By Cherie Dimaline
