Book review: Killers of the Flower Moon

Say it ain't so

Author: David Grann
Awesome Index: 9.65 / 10

Martin Scorcese’s film adaptation of Killers of the Flower Moon, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, is scheduled to hit theatres on October 20. While it certainly looks promising, there’s no doubt that the book provides more detail, historical scope and depth. Not to mention that since the movie clocks in at three hours and 26 minutes, it will probably take you as much time to read the book. (Yes — that’s how good it is.) So while we eagerly await the film next month, here is a review of David Grann’s epic account of the monstrous tragedy that befell the Osage tribe.

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It’s very difficult to enjoy and praise a non-fiction book that exposes the barbaric cruelty, seedy corruption and downright inhumanity that lurks among us.

This is the feeling you’ll get when you devour this remarkable true story of the Osage tribe, set in Oklahoma in the 1920s, whose members perished under mysterious and violent circumstances, pushing the federal government to eventually intervene, leading to the creation of the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover.

Weaving the grim tale from an extraordinary array of historical sources, police reports and interviews, author David Grann paints a lurid picture of life’s shocking brutality and lawlessness on the frontier at the turn of the century; so much, that you’ll have to occasionally pause throughout the book, to remind yourself that this madness really happened only a century ago, in the land of freedom and opportunity.

There perhaps hasn’t been such a compelling and engrossing true crime book since In Cold Blood by Truman Capote. And while the complexity of the conspiracy orchestrated against the Osage may be dizzying at times, Grann makes sure we can follow along, methodically putting in place every sordid character and plot twist, and ultimately uncovering an even darker, terrifying secret in the end.

In the wake of the recent school scandals in Canada, this book is a reminder that when it comes to Indigenous affairs in North America, no matter how opinionated or oblivious we may be to the subject, we should, for starters, really limit our reactions to silence and shame.

This is exactly what you’ll experience after finishing this horribly riveting book: long moments of gut-wrenching silence and profound outrage, wondering how this could have possibly happened, followed by the inevitable shame for what Aboriginal peoples had — and still have — to endure.