Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii: Life Beyond Settler Colonialism by Joseph Weiss Vancouver: UBC Press, 2018 $32.95 / 9780774837590 Reviewed by Molly Clarkson * I’ll admit that I approached Dr. Joseph Weiss’s Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii: Life Beyond Settler Colonialism with a not-insignificant amount of trepidation. Another ethnographic examination of the Haida…
Read more #492 Future-making in Haida Gwaii
The God of Gods: A Canadian Play by Carroll Aikins, edited and with an introduction by Kailin Wright Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 2016 $29.95 / 9780776623276 Reviewed by Ginny Ratsoy First published Feb. 19, 2019 * Although a remarkable piece of British Columbia’s theatre history played out not far from where I write and…
Read more #490 Applauding a forgotten play
Memories of a Metis Settlement: Eighty Years of East Prairie Metis Settlement by Constance Brissenden (editor) Penticton: Theytus Books, 2018 $14.89 / 9781926886503 Reviewed by Angie Tucker First published Feb. 11, 2019 * When I first received Constance Brissenden’s book, I thumbed through the pages, stopping to look at the faces and places in…
Read more #483 Métis bannock, Métis kinship
On The Rocks with Jack Knox: Islanders I will Never Forget by Jack Knox Victoria: Heritage House, 2018 $19.95 / 9781772032666 Reviewed by Keith Norbury First published Feb. 8, 2019 * It’s often said that journalism represents the first rough draft of history. As a reporter, editor, and columnist with the Victoria Times Colonist daily…
Read more #481 Island characters
Out of the Woods: Woodworkers along the Salish Sea by Pirjo Raits (text) and Dale Roth and Michele Ramberg (photos) Victoria: Heritage House, 2018 $34.95 / 9781772032604 Reviewed by Grahame Ware First published Feb. 3, 2019 * There are trees … which in their single lives have spanned the entire history of civilized man. We…
Read more #477 Art of the forest & turbulent sea
Trail North: The Okanagan Trail of 1856-68 and its Origins in British Columbia and Washington by Ken Mather Victoria: Heritage House, 2018 $22.95 / 9781772032307 Reviewed by Harold Rhenisch First published January 24th, 2019 * The British Columbia grasslands became cattle country, between 1858 and 1868, largely through the effects of a cattle route called…
Read more #472 Okanagan trade & cattle trail
Costly Fix: Power, Politics and Nature in the Tar Sands by Ian Urquhart Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018 $39.95 / 9781487594619 Oil’s Deep State: How the Petroleum Industry Undermines Democracy and Stops Action on Global Warming by Kevin Taft Toronto: Lorimer, 2017 $29.95 / 9781459409972 The Big Stall: How Big Oil and Think Tanks…
Read more #468 Power, petroleum, and pipelines
INTERVIEW: Shelagh Rogers by Starlight: CBC’s Host of The Next Chapter Shines a Light on Indigenous Authors by Margot Fedoruk * Shelagh Rogers walks in with an air of authority and greets everyone warmly as she stands in line at the local coffee shop on Gabriola Island. Rogers wears the iconic pointy blue glasses that…
Read more #466 A tribute to Richard Wagamese
Starlight: An Unfinished Novel by Richard Wagamese Toronto: Penguin Random House (McClelland & Stewart), 2018 $19.95 / 9780771070877 Reviewed by Eldon Yellowhorn * Wagamese divides his straightforward narrative into a prologue and three sections, though the last is truncated by his death. The publisher then provides a note explaining the decision to release Starlight as…
Read more #463 Escape from the Nechako Valley
Re-awakening Ancient Salish Sea Basketry: Fifty Years of Basketry Studies in Culture and Science by Ed Carriere and Dale R. Croes Richland, WA: Journal of Northwest Anthropology (JONA), Memoir Number 15, January 2018 $54.95 (U.S.) / 9781973968221 Available from Amazon.com through CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform Reviewed by Andrea Laforet First published Jan. 8, 2019 * In this…
Read more #462 Baskets across the border
The Collectors: A History of the Royal British Columbia Museum and Archives by Patricia E. Roy Victoria: Royal British Columbia Museum Press, 2018 $39.95 / 9780772672001 Reviewed by Chad Reimer First published Dec. 18, 2018 * In The Collectors: A History of the Royal British Columbia Museum and Archives, Patricia Roy sets herself a daunting…
Read more #450 Classifying British Columbia
Raven Walks Around the World: Life of a Wandering Activist by Thom Henley Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2017 $32.95 / 9781550178074 Reviewed by Philip Van Huizen First published Dec. 15, 2018 * Autobiographies by environmentalists are nothing new, especially in BC. Greenpeace alone is its own cottage industry, with practically all of its founders producing…
Read more #448 South Moresby activist memoir
Salish Blankets: Robes of Protection and Transformation, Symbols of Wealth by Leslie H. Tepper, Janice George, and Willard Joseph Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 2017 $40.00 (U.S.) / 9780803296923 Reviewed by Liz Hammond-Kaarremaa First published Dec. 8, 2018 * Imagine a blanket spread out on a table. It is a Salish blanket, over a hundred years old, humble,…
Read more #442 Honouring Salish blankets
Shared Histories: Witsuwit’en-Settler Relations in Smithers, British Columbia, 1913-1973 by Tyler McCreary Smithers: Creekstone Press, 2018 $24.95 / 9781928195047 Reviewed by Keith D. Smith First published Dec. 5, 2018 * Long before the release of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s final report in 2015, many observers struggled to figure out how we got to a…
Read more #440 The future is settler-Witsuwit’en
Claiming the Land: British Columbia and the Making of a New Eldorado by Daniel Marshall Vancouver: Ronsdale Press, 2018 $24.95 / 9781553805021 Reviewed by Mark Forsythe First published Dec. 3, 2018 * We are pleased to reprint Mark Forsythe’s review of Daniel Marshall’s Claiming the Land: British Columbia and the Making of a New Eldorado, a…
Read more #438 The Americans are coming
Otter’s Journey Through Indigenous Language and Law by Lindsay Borrows Vancouver: UBC Press, 2018 $32.95 / 9780774836586 Reviewed by Hadley Friedland First published Dec. 3, 2018 * Lindsay Borrows is both a gifted story-teller and a meticulous researcher. In her first book, Otter’s Journey Through Indigenous Language and Law, readers benefit from both strengths. Borrows’…
Read more #437 Otter goes global
Before and After the State: Politics, Poetics, and People(s) in the Pacific Northwest by Allan K. McDougall, Lisa Philips, and Daniel L. Boxberger Vancouver: UBC Press, 2018 $34.95 / 9780774836685 Reviewed by John Douglas Belshaw * One cannot these days escape the slogan of the Trump campaign: “Make America Great Again.” Set aside GDP, living…
Read more #433 Discord on the Pacific slope
Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age by Darrel J. McLeod Madeira Park: Douglas & McIntyre, 2018 $29.95 / 9781771622004 Reviewed by David Milward * Darrel McLeod’s Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age has won the 2018 Governor General’s Literary Award for non-fiction. From Treaty Eight territory at Smith, Alberta, McLeod studied French literature and education at…
Read more #422 A tale of trauma and achievement
A Not-so-Savage Land: The Art and Times of Frederick Whymper, 1838-1901 by Peter Johnson, foreword by Robert Amos Victoria: Heritage House, 2018 $24.95 / 9781772032208 Reviewed by Michael Layland First published October 29th, 2018 * The English artist Frederick Whymper (1838-1901) spent the years 1862-66 in colonial Vancouver Island and British Columbia, producing technical and…
Read more #409 With Whymper to the Pacific
Gracie by Joan MacLeod Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2018 $16.95 / 9781772012026 * Thanks for Giving by Kevin Loring Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2018 $19.95 / 9781772012187 Both books reviewed by Ginny Ratsoy First published October 26, 2018 * Editor’s note: Ginny Ratsoy reviews the latest work of two of B.C.’s top playwrights, Joan MacLeod (born 1954) and Kevin…
Read more #408 Grizzly twins & latter-day saints