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
Not Extinct: Keeping the Sinixt Way by Marilyn James and Taress Alexis Nelson: Maa Press, 2018 $30.00 / 9780968530283 Reviewed by Paula Pryce First published October 24, 2018 * Editor’s note: Anthropologist Paula Pryce, author of the pathbreaking Keeping the Lakes’ Way (1999), revisits the Sinixt people, previously known as the Lakes people, whose traditional territory comprised…
Read more #406 The Sinixt are not extinct
Archaeology of the Lower Fraser River Region by Mike K. Rousseau, editor Burnaby: Archaeology Press of Simon Fraser University, 2017 $30.00 / 9781772870121 Reviewed by Robert (Bob) Muckle Also open access. Free download: http://archpress.lib.sfu.ca/index.php/archpress/catalog/book/72 First published Oct. 8, 2018 * In 2011, Mike Rousseau recruited 33 active archaeologists and scholars in related disciplines to contribute…
Read more #395 Meanwhile, 5,000 years ago
Out of Concealment: Female Supernatural Beings of Haida Gwaii by gid7ahl-gudsllaay lalaxaaygans (Terri-Lynn Williams-Davidson), with forewords by Wade Davis and gwaaganad (Diane Brown) Victoria: Heritage House, 2017 $29.95 / 9781772031607 Reviewed by Gillian Crowther * In Out of Concealment: Female Supernatural Beings of Haida Gwaii, Haida artist and activist Terri-Lynn Williams-Davidson encounters 33 supernatural beings of Haida mythology….
Read more #394 Supernatural Haida Columbia
Indian Fishing: Early Methods on the Northwest Coast by Hilary Stewart, foreword by Michael Kew Madeira Park: Douglas & McIntyre, 2018 (first published by J.J. Douglas, 1977) $28.95 / 9781771621854 Reviewed by Dana Lepofsky First published Sept. 30, 2018 * Editor’s Note: Born in Saint Lucia in the West Indies in 1924, Hilary Majendie Stewart…
Read more #388 Indian fishing revived
Buffy Sainte-Marie: The Authorized Biography by Andrea Warner, foreword by Joni Mitchell Vancouver: Greystone Books 2018 $36.00 / 9781771643580 Reviewed by Jo-Anne Fiske First published Sept. 29, 2018 * Envision a young woman, naïve and conservative in 1965. She sat proudly in her undergraduate history class as the professor led discussion on the fifty-year commemoration…
Read more #387 Up where she belongs
Those Born at Koona: The Totem Poles of the Haida Village Skedans, Haida Gwaii by Carolyn and John Smyly Surrey: Hancock House, 2018 (first published 1973) $29.95 / 9780888391018 Reviewed by Dan Savard First published Sept. 27, 2018 * In 1957, John Smyly (1924-2002) was hired as carpenter by the Provincial Museum of British Columbia…
Read more #385 The carpenter of Koona
First published Sept. 23, 2018. Aboriginal Peoples and the Law: A Critical Introduction by Jim Reynolds Vancouver: UBC Press, 2018 (Purich Books) $29.95 / 9780774880213 Reviewed by Neil Vallance * “Much of Canadian Aboriginal law has evolved from cases originating in the Province of British Columbia,” notes reviewer Neil Vallance. Among the leading B.C. cases…
Read more #382 An Aboriginal body of law
Obstruction of Justice: The Search for Truth on Canada’s Highway of Tears by Ray Michalko Markham, ON: Red Deer Press, 2016 $19.95 / 9780889955455 Reviewed by Bonnie Reilly Schmidt First published Sept. 17, 2017 * For ten years, ex-Mountie Ray Michalko investigated the fate of the missing or murdered women and girls on B.C.’s infamous…
Read more #377 Truth for the Highway of Tears
Kuei, My Friend: A Conversation on Race and Reconciliation by Deni Ellis Béchard and Natasha Kanapé Fontaine, translated by Deni Ellis Béchard and Howard Scott Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2018 $19.95 / 9781772011951 Reviewed by Dylan Burrows First published September 07th, 2018 * Following the controversial death of 11-year old Ojibwe girl Makayla Sault from leukaemia in…
Read more #368 “Walk like an Indian”
First published Aug. 30, 2018. Claiming the Land: British Columbia and the Making of a New El Dorado by Daniel Marshall Vancouver: Ronsdale Press, 2018. $24.95 / 9781553805021 Reviewed by Harold Rhenisch * “The history of British Columbia is brief,” wrote W.A. Bailie-Grohman. “Gold made it and gold unmade it.” In Claiming the Land, Daniel Marshall…
Read more #360 Gold made British Columbia
Damming the Peace: The Hidden Costs of the Site C Dam by Wendy Holm (editor) Toronto: James Lorimer and Company, 2018 $22.95 / 9781459413160 Reviewed by John Gellard First published Aug. 26, 2018 * The 16 contributors to Wendy Holm’s Damming the Peace: The Hidden Costs of the Site C Dam try to make sense…
Read more #353 Another Peace offering
The Cure for Death by Lightning: A Play Adapted from the Novel by Gail Anderson-Dargatz by Daryl Cloran Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2018 $18.95 / 9781772012057 * Talker’s Town and The Girl who Swam Forever: Two Plays by Nelson Gray and Marie Clements Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2018 $18.95 / 9781772012019 Reviewed by Ginny Ratsoy First published Aug. 15,…
Read more #344 Curative plays
Through Different Eyes by Karen Charleson Winnipeg: Signature Editions, 2017 $19.95 / 9781773240060 Reviewed by Paul Headrick First published July 3, 2018 * Through Different Eyes focuses on three women living in Kitsum, a remote First Nations fishing village on Vancouver Island’s west coast. Lonely sixteen-year-old Brenda Joe longs to fit in with the…
Read more #335 Kitsum on Hesquiat Harbour
Southern Northwest Coast Indigenous Canoe Racing: A Brief History by Alan L. Hoover Victoria: NWC Canoe Publications, 2018 $14.95 / 9781775011903 Reviewed by Sanford Osler First published Jul. 2, 2018 * Once a year my local oceanfront park in North Vancouver fills with campers bringing dozens of long sleek wooden canoes to race over the…
Read more #333 Indigenous canoe racing
Sculpture in Canada: A History by Maria Tippett Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 2017 $39.95 / 9781771620932 Reviewed by Catherine Nutting First published June 26, 2018 * Maria Tippett’s Sculpture in Canada is, she writes, not an encyclopedia, but an introduction; an eye-opener to some of the greatest Canadian sculpture. The book is an ambitious project….
Read more #329 From inuksuit to cyberspace