First Published April 5, 2017 During a speech in 2017, Richard Mackie lamented the loss of historical buildings on Vancouver Island for a NIC Elder College lecture entitled “Dead Dog or Land of Plenty? Creating and Effacing History in the Comox Valley.” by George Le Masurier | Apr 4, 2017 *** Fresh out of university…
Read more #115 Alas, poor Comox
Medicine Unbundled: A Journey Through the Minefields of Indigenous Health Care by Gary Geddes Victoria: Heritage House, 2017 $22.95 / 9781772031645 Reviewed by Mary-Ellen Kelm First published April 4, 2017 * Harold Cardinal’s assessment of Canada’s Indigenous policy in 1969 as “a thinly disguised programme of extermination” in The Unjust Society is born out almost…
Read more #114 From apartheid to resurgence
Ecology of Salmonids in Estuaries Around the World: Adaptations, Habitats, and Conservation by Colin D. Levings Vancouver: UBC Press, 2016 $75.00 / 9780774831734 Reviewed by Bert Ionson First Published April 4, 2017 * Colin Levings’ encyclopedic treatment of how sea going salmon, trout and char make their transition from fresh to salt water (and the…
Read more #113 Why we need estuaries
Exhibiting Nation: Multicultural Nationalism (And Its Limits) in Canada’s Museums by Caitlin Gordon-Walker Vancouver: UBC Press, 2016 $32.95 / 9780774831642 Reviewed by Mike Starr First published April 2, 2017 * In Exhibiting Nation, Caitlin Gordon-Walker explores the ways in which Canadian multicultural nationalism has influenced exhibits at three of the country’s major museums. Gordon-Walker suggests…
Read more #112 When good isn’t good enough
The Secular Northwest: Religion and Irreligion in Everyday Postwar Life by Tina Block Vancouver: UBC Press, 2017 $32.95 / 9780774831291 Reviewed by Chelsea Horton First Published March 31, 2017 * Tina Block has examined the nature of atheism in British Columbia and Washington State in the postwar period. “This was not a universally secular region,”…
Read more #111 Leave religion at the Rockies
Bill Reid Collected by Martine J. Reid Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 2016, in collaboration with the Bill Reid Centre $19.95 / 9781771621151 Reviewed by Victoria Wyatt First Published March 28, 2017 * Much has been written about Bill Reid (1920-1998), the internationally known Haida artist whose monumental works appear in contexts such as the Canadian…
Read more #110 Bill Reid’s legacy enhanced
Great Fortune Dream: The Struggles and Triumphs of Chinese Settlers in Canada, 1858-1966 by David Chuenyan Lai and Ding Guo Halfmoon Bay: Caitlin Press, 2016 $26.95 / 9781987915037 Reviewed by Tzu-I Chung First published March 27, 2107 * In Great Fortune Dream, David Chuenyan Lai and Ding Guo tell of the struggles and triumphs of…
Read more #109 From exclusion to equality
White Settler Reserve: New Iceland and the Colonization of the Canadian West by Ryan Eyford Vancouver: UBC Press, 2016 $32.95 / 9780774831598 Reviewed by Emma Battell Lowman and Adam J. Barker First published March 24, 2017 * From B.C. pioneer Gilbert Sproat to k.d. lang, in White Settler Reserve historian Ryan Eyford traces the little-known…
Read more #108 New Iceland in Canada
Where Mountains Meet The Sea: an Illustrated History of the District of North Vancouver by Daniel Francis Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2016 $39.95. 9781550177510 Reviewed by Trevor Carolan First Published March 22, 2017 * Daniel Francis, editor of the Encyclopedia of British Columbia and another twenty-four titles, turns his capable hand to local history in…
Read more #107 Moodyville, mudflats & Maisie
Beyond Germs: Native Depopulation in North America Catherine M. Cameron, Paul Kelton, and Alan C. Swedlund (editors) Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2015 U.S. $29.95 / 9780816535545 Reviewed by Jody Decker First published March 18, 2017 * As a follow-up to Courtney Kirk’s review of Tom Swanky’s controversial The Smallpox War in Nuxalk Territory [See…
Read more #106 Devastation beyond germs
Canucks in Khaki: Langley, the Lower Mainland, and the Great War of 1914 to 1918 by Warren Sommer Fort Langley: Legacy Heritage Consultants, 2017 $39.95 / 9780995803701 an extract from the foreword by Mark Forsythe First Published March 16, 2017 * A biting wind whips up from the Douai Plain; stabs of rain push us back…
Read more #105 From Aldergrove to Vimy Ridge
The Dad Dialogues: A Correspondence on Fatherhood (and the Universe) by George Bowering and Charles Demers Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2016 $17.95 / 9781551526621 Reviewed by Christian Fink-Jensen First published March 15, 2017 * Vancouver writers George Bowering, born in 1935, and Charles Demers, born in 1980, had daughters – Thea and Josephine – more…
Read more #104 Literary greenhorn dads
Originally published March 13, 2017 REVIEW: The Smallpox War in Nuxalk Territory by Tom Swanky Surrey: Dragon Heart Enterprises, 2016. $39.95 / 978-1-365-41053-6 Reviewed by Courtney Kirk * In 1862, colonial officials, supported by merchants, surveyors, and road builders, concocted a get-rich-quick scheme to link the coast of B.C. at Bella Coola to the…
Read more #103 Tainted blankets, tainted history
If we are not collectively mindful, Joni Mitchell will have no more rivers to skate away on. It’ll mostly be Canoes Only on the Rideau Canal. Ice hockey could be declared an Endangered Sport. The only ski resorts will be atop of the Alps; Whistler will be for golf. With a catastrophically narcissistic president in…
Read more #102 Hockey is an endangered sport
ESSAY: The story of a suitcase by Graham Brazier * From the cryptic contents of a stray suitcase that he inherited from a distant relative, Graham Brazier of Denman Island resurrects the otherwise forgotten personal history of Annie Watson (née Edwards, 1883-1966). Annie arrived in Winnipeg in 1910 and settled in Vancouver a few years…
Read more #101 The story of a suitcase
The Ghosts We Know by Sean Karemaker Wolfville, NS: Conundrum Press, 2016 $20.00 / 9781772620030 Reviewed by Michael Kluckner First published March 7, 2017 * In his first book, The Ghosts We Know, Sean Karemaker presents an artist’s recent journey through life on coastal B.C. from the quiet corners of rural Vancouver Island to the…
Read more #100 The hermit of Chemainus
First Published March 6, 2017 REVIEW: Oscar of Between: A Memory of Identity and Ideas by Betsy Warland Halfmoon Bay: Caitlin Press, 2016. $21.95 / 978-1-987915-16-7 Reviewed by Catriona Sandilands * In 2007, Betsy Warland took a birthday trip to London for a range of plays and events, including an exhibition on military camouflage at…
Read more #99 Opening the Oscar envelope
A Perfect Eden: Encounters by Early Explorers of Vancouver Island by Michael Layland Victoria: TouchWood Editions, 2016 $39.95 / 9781771511773 Reviewed by Robin Fisher First published Mar. 3, 2017 * When I returned to the coast after a decade living on the prairies I settled initially on Vancouver Island. Speaking to a friend who had…
Read more #98 Early Island attachments
Hell’s History: The United Steelworkers’ Fight to Prevent Workplace Deaths and Injuries from the 1992 Westray Mine Disaster through 2016 by Tom Sandborn Vancouver: United Steelworkers, 2016 9780995843707 Out of print in hard copy but free digital copy available here. Reviewed by Ron Verzuh First published Mar. 1, 2017 * Tom Sandborn’s Hell’s History opens…
Read more #97 Getting away with murder
Belonging Métis by Catherine Richardson (Kinewesquao) Vernon: J. Charlton Publishing, 2016 $30.00 / 9781926476070 Reviewed by Émilie Pigeon First published Feb. 28, 2017 * Despite being recognized as one of the three Aboriginal peoples of Canada in the Constitution Act of 1982, the Métis remain hard to define. From Vancouver Island to Labrador their…
Read more #96 Métis longing and belonging