An utterly engaging and compelling read with one of the moat.unique storyline I've read. A reindeer is found killed at.the beginning of the novel. The main voice if the novel is told by the young girl who raised the reindeer. Highly recommended.

I absolutely loved this look at modern Sami reindeer herders and the continuing discrimination against them in Swedish society. Elsa is a determined young woman dealing with lifelong trauma after witnessing a horrifying incident as a child. Laestadius creates an incredible, nuanced look at life for Elsa, her family, and close friends as the impact of violent and illegal poaching continues to echo through the community. I really appreciated the way things like masculinity, mental health, addiction, Christianity, and modernization of herding were incorporated into the story, giving a really insightful look at life for the Sami people today.

Easily one of my favorite books coming out in 2023 I've read so far, and I have already begun recommending this to friends and followers. Highly recommend, and can't wait for the Netflix adaptation as well.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this book.
This is one of the top five books I’ve read this year. It is beautifully written about a culture I knew nothing about. The translation from Swedish has to be terrific. The writing is fluid and compelling.
The book is the story of Elsa, a Sami indigenous person living above the artic circle. Her family are reindeer herders. The story opens with nine year old Elsa witnessing her reindeer calf being murdered, the murderer threatening her life if she tells, and follows her into adulthood. Though the book is a novel, the author tells us in her acknowledgment that the harassment, the reindeer murders, and the police looking the other way are all true and continue to this day.
I also learned how climate change is affecting a way of life above the artic circle in ways I would never have thought about.
I can’t say enough wonderful things about this book. Buckle up and get ready for a terrific ride into the Artic.

Stolen by Ann-Helen Laestadius is a testament to minorities everywhere; the experiences of being "less-than" are similar across all civilizations. The wanting of people to be the ones in charge and on top is perhaps written in our DNA. Books like Stolen help point out the shortcomings of the ones in charge, they are no different than the ones they try to dominate in their human-ness.

Stolen shows how the indigenous Sami population of Scandinavian northernmost regions are the caretakers of mostly wild reindeer. The reindeer need the help of human intervention to survive because the lichen which makes up a large portion of their natural diet is disappearing.

When some reindeer disappear and some of them are left dead, it becomes obvious that, to misquote Shakespeare, there is "Something rotten in Sweden". The local police cannot seem to catch the perpetrators. The killing of reindeer is considered "theft" so is not the priority the Sami reindeer herders consider it to be. Some local people of Swedish descent call the Sami "Lapps", which is a racial slur perhaps akin to calling African Americans by the "n" word in the United States. The Sami do not get attention from the police they rightly should.

Stolen is a worthwhile read, it points out the wrong-ness of prejudice and discrimination without actually needing to know about the Sami, kind of the same way Dr. Seuss makes the same point about the Sneeches. There is a certain power in coming to the book with no preconceived notions about the people in the story. It is also a story that causes us to think about our own place in the world.

Disclaimer: ARC via Netgalley.
Elsa comes from a Sami whose reindeer herds is constantly under attack – not just poaching but also violent and abusive attacks. The Swedish police do not view these attacks as what they are - hate crimes and animal abuse. They view them as theft only. Hence the title of the novel.
Laestadius novel does capture the conflict of a people and culture under attack from a variety of different points. There is the attack on the reindeer, the livelihood for many of the Sami families, there is the effects of climate change, there is the conflict between traditional versus what some young adults wants (Elsa wants control over a reindeer herd for instance), there is the fetishization of the Sami by tourists who really don’t care about the people they are so determined to photograph, and there are the 1001 dramas that happen in every family.
The book is good, solid. It focuses on a culture that is usually not dealt with books that get attention here in America. Additionally there are some wonderful brilliant passages. Laestadius writes extremely well in describing the natural word but also the inner conflicts in families that always are not spoken.
The book covers much - the trauma of a forced school system, the impact of mental illness, the outsiders in insular communities. And it all feels real. The characters are not only believable but at many times feel as if they could walk off the page (or in my case the kindle screen).
The book does have a couple of flaws. The first section of the book, the section with Elsa as a young girl, feels too long. At times, Elsa is the only one that is special or good or interesting in her generation and this feels too much like the very unique one. This is alleviated somewhat with the introduction of Minna, a friend whose default setting is fighting back, but not by much. At times, as well, the book feels unrelenting grim, which considering the subject matter is not too surprising. One does wish for a bit more focus on some other minor characters as well. At times it feels like too few plot threads are dealt with or resolved.
The ending is somewhat predictable, but also extremely powerful. While not a perfect book, this is well worth the reading.

In Stolen we follow the lives of a multi-generational village of indigenous Sami peoples living in Sweden. As they try to follow their traditional way of life herding reindeer in the context of modern society, they must contend with prejudice: climate change, and brutal crimes against their animals and themselves. Told through the voices of different members of the community, this engaging and often heartbreaking story opens a window onto a way of life that most Americans, if they are aware of at all, think of as quaint or old-fashioned. Highly recommended.

Oh. My. Goodness. I gobbled this book up in a day. I'm fascinated my Scandinavian culture and literature so I was thrilled to get this ARC. Wow there's so much I didn't know! The author pulls heavily from her Sami culture and, while this is marketed as fiction, so much of it is based on true events. I'm in love with this book and will certainly be buying her next book, sight unseen