Indigenous Peoples in Canada

Firsthand narratives from Northern and Indigenous cancer survivors and caregivers offer compassionate advice and insightful analysis about healthcare in rural northern communities.

A cancer diagnosis can be life changing for anyone, bringing new physical and emotional realities, changed relationships, and often frustration when dealing with healthcare systems. But living north of sixty means dealing with a higher level of healthcare inequity. Agnes Pascal compiles firsthand narratives from Northern and Indigenous cancer survivors and caregivers that illuminate the unique challenges of healthcare accessibility in the North.

In this rare volume, more than thirty voices offer compassionate advice and insightful analysis born from experience. With courage and dignity, they discuss fear, grief, and death; the logistics of medical travel for treatment; Indigenous and Western medicine; structural determinants of health, including industrial pollution and environmental racism; and the impacts of residential schools and “Indian hospitals” on northern communities. In these pages people share that hope comes from building healing communities.

This book is for people with cancer and their caregivers; health policy makers and advocates; scholars and practitioners of healthcare, Indigenous governance, or environmental racism; and anyone interested grassroots, community-based peer support.

Reviews
“This book is a chorus of bravery, one every health practitioner should read so they can understand that as devastating as a cancer diagnosis is to the patient, it also affects the patient’s family, extended family and community. Thankfully, there is hope once diagnosed and the stories from these survivors is a testimony to the power of compassion, technology, teamwork, follow up and after care. I am in awe of the humility, courage, insight and gratitude in every story here. Mahsi cho.”- Richard Van Camp, author of Gather: Richard Van Camp on the Joy of Storytelling

“Prioritizing the voices of northern and Indigenous cancer patients, especially those from small communities, is critical for ensuring positive change within the Northwest Territories healthcare system. The inner strength of patients and the insights they share, are a gift to us all. ”- Stephanie Irlbacher-Fox, scientific director at Hotıì ts’eeda

Additional Information
192 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | 30 Contributor Photos | Paperback

A journalistic poetry collection reflecting on Palestinian and Indigenous solidarities, genocides, life, and liberation.

In October 2023, upon witnessing the escalation of Palestinian genocide, Ktunaxa poet Smokii Sumac began writing poems reflecting on the stories of Palestinians in Gaza who were risking their lives to share news of the genocide of Palestinian culture, literature, and life. These 100 poems offer a witnessing of the escalation of colonial violence, both current and historical, across oceans, lands, cultures, and people, and the reckoning one has in the face of a genocide.

Vulnerable, eloquent, compassionate, and enduring, Born Sacred is an in-time reflection honouring the shared histories of Indigenous Peoples of North America and of the people in Palestine. Sumac offers this collection as a small piece of life dedicated to Palestinians and resounds the collective call for solidarity in our shared liberation.

Reviews
"Born Sacred: Poems for Palestine is a profound work of grace and solidarity, rooted in a hard-earned understanding of colonialism’s insatiable appetite. What Smokii Sumac has done, over the course of 100 searing, open-hearted poems, is give voice to the immeasurable grief of bearing witness to genocide – the overwhelming magnitude of it, colliding with a knowledge that this has happened before, that there is an age-old methodology to the act of endless taking. I am so grateful for this work, for this beautiful, honest reminder that, whatever power empires wield, we have what it can never take. We have one another."— Omar El Akkad, author of What Strange Paradise

"The succinct starkness of Smokii Sumac’s offerings are an X-Ray to the grief and absurdity of our times. This dangerous dichotomy of trying to live one’s everyday life while holding the tragedy of everyday loss is profoundly captured in each stanza."— Catherine Hernandez, author and screenwriter of Scarborough

"This collection is the antidote to the silence and cowardice of millions, and the medicine for those who watched the first recorded genocide unfold and needed to be seen and witnessed. Creating room for collective grief, Smokii Sumac shows us the responsibility and power of the poet to face the blank page in the here and now and the necessity for words to remain as a testimony to history. Born Sacred is an essential work in the fight for collective liberation and a reminder that hope can be rooted in allyship." — Rayya Liebich, author of Min Hayati

"I am always drawn to the constellational consciousness that permeates so many Asian refugee, Indigenous, and Black literary and cultural works. This constellational consciousness, the culturally-informed relational view of life and solidarity in struggle, is vital in Smokii Sumac’s collection. In both form and content, the poems shatter dominating linear and compartmentalizing interpretations of the world with constellating stanzas, voices, and experiences that reveal the intertwined histories and presents of colonial harm and Indigenous survivance."— Maral Aguilera-Moradipour, assistant professor, Asian refugee literatures and cultures, SFU

Additional Information
160 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback

A tenth anniversary bilingual edition in English and Cree of Rosanna Deerchild’s stunning collection about the intergenerational impacts of the Canadian residential school system.

you want me to
share my story

ok then
here it is
here in the unwritten
here in the broken lines
of my body that can never forget

In Calling Down the Sky, poet Rosanna Deerchild viscerally evokes her mother’s experience within the residential school system, the Canadian government’s system of violently removing Indigenous children from their homes, families, and languages in an explicit attempt to destroy Indigenous cultures and identities. With precise and intricate poetry, Deerchild weaves together the story of her mother’s childhood and Deerchild’s memories of her mother: her love of country music, her attempts to talk about what happened to her, how tightly she braided her daughter’s hair on the first day of school. In doing so, Deerchild illustrates the disruptive and devastating impacts of the residential school system on generations of families while also celebrating the life and culture of her mother and other survivors.

Published for the first time in a bilingual edition of Cree and English, in time for the tenth anniversary of the original publication, Calling Down the Sky is an intimate and gorgeously evoked reckoning with a horrifying part of North American history.

Reviews
“Rosanna Deerchild’s poems roll off the tongue as easy as old country songs. With her deft hand, Deerchild finely tunes every word and weaves them together as intimately as she braids her girls’ hair. Together, these poems create a story that sings with beautiful tension, amazing resilience, and love as big as the sky." - Katherena Vermette, Métis Writer

"The poetry collection, called calling down the sky, describes personal experiences with the residential school system in the 1950s and the generational effects it had." - CBC 

"This poetry collection is fierce, raw and candid. It is also visceral, intricate and, above all, illuminating. By recounting her mother’s residential school experience in a powerfully poetic narrative, Deerchild expertly illustrates the heartbreaking trauma of that tragic saga and how it complicates relationships over generations. By beautifully and elaborately exploring those relationships and that devastating history, she finds and celebrates the resilient and hopeful spirit that many residential school survivors, like her mother, have managed to retain in the face of horror and torment. As a result, calling down the sky is an essential read in understanding the true modern history of this land and in honouring the people who survived it.” - Waubgeshig Rice

Educator Information
Bilingual: English and Cree

Additional Information
96 pages | 5.50" x 8.50"

A Métis girl is adopted by a Mennonite family in this breathtaking memoir about family lost and found—for those who loved From the Ashes and Educated.

By the time Brittany Penner is seven years old, she has loved and lost twenty-one foster siblings who have come into her family and left—all of them Indigenous like her. "When will it be my turn?" she asks her mother time and time again. "When will I be taken away?" You won't be, she is told. You're adopted. You're here to stay. You're the lucky one.

On the day of her birth in 1989, near the end of the Sixties Scoop, Brittany was relinquished into the care of the government and adopted by a white Mennonite family in a small prairie town. Her name and where she came from are hidden from her; all she is told is that she is Métis. Her childhood is shaped by church, family, service and silence. Her family is continuously shifting as siblings arrive and depart, one by one. She knows that to stay, she has to force herself into the mold created for her. She must be obedient. Quiet. Good. No matter what.

Whenever she looks in the mirror, she searches her features, wondering if they've been passed down to her by her biological mother. She thinks, if she can find her mother, she'll find all the answers she's looking for. As Brittany moves into adulthood, she will uncover answers—but they will be more tangled than she could have imagined.

Children Like Us asks difficult questions about family, identity, belonging and cultural continuity. What happens when you find what you're looking for, but it can't offer you everything you need? How do you reckon with the truth of your own story when you've always been told you're lucky and should be grateful? What does it mean to belong when you feel torn between cultures? And how does a person learn to hold the pain and the grief, as well as the triumphs, the joys and the beauty, allowing none to eclipse the others?

Reviews
"Children Like Us is a luminous memoir about identity, loss and belonging. Adopted at birth by a white Mennonite family, Brittany Penner grows up straddling two worlds—one she knows and one that remains just out of reach. As she pieces together her origins, she reckons with the complexities of family, love and cultural displacement. Both intimate and unflinching, Children Like Us is a powerful exploration of what it means to know where you come from—and what it costs when that knowledge is withheld." —Adrienne Brodeur, nationally bestselling author of Wild Game

"An absolutely mesmerizing debut. It was a privilege to bear witness to Brittany Penner's story about intergenerational trauma, identity, and belonging. The kinds of complicated grief we so often experience in life are born out of the complexity of human relationships and our fierce ability to both hurt and heal one another. Penner explores this truth deftly, with wisdom, compassion and grace. I hope everyone reads this book." —Claire Bidwell Smith, author of The Rules of Inheritance

Additional Information
384 pages | 5.62" x 8.25" | Paperback

Commonwealth is a profound lyrical meditation on the pre- and post-colonial migrations of the Lenape population throughout the American Midwest, from the watershed of Weli Sipu (the Ohio River) in the Commonwealth of Kentucky to Indiana and beyond. This is a book that transcribes the languages of rivers, highways, rail lines, and buffalo traces. It seeks—or is pushed toward—destinations that are always over the horizon. It is about the fluidity of space and time, and the tangibility of history. As the Lenape journey ever northward and westward, they both create and are created by a collective body of stories: stories of belonging and exclusion, of freedom and confinement, of aspirations and hard truths. Commonwealth explores the ways landscape and people inform one another, and does so in a way that is as clear as a broad Ohio sky.

Additional Information
116 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback

Isidor, a half-coyote, half-wolf coywolf, has always struggled to find his place as a half-breed. After the untimely death of his mother, he leaves his community to roam across prairies, forests, and mountains, sharing stories in his search for kinship and belonging. But as Sharp-Tooths are increasingly policed, tagged, or killed to make way for insatiable human expansion, Isidor and his pack are forced to make impossible decisions. Do they retreat to better their chances of survival, or risk everything by joining a resistance of rogue animals to protect what’s left of their homeland?

In this gripping drama, Colin Wolf weaves a powerful allegory through the lives of animals, paralleling the displacement of Métis people and the enduring struggle for Indigenous land rights on Turtle Island. CoyWolf is a hopepunk thriller and a roadmap for young revolutionaries navigating the realities of resistance, doing your best, and learning the wisdom of those who have walked the path before.

Additional Information
112 pages | 5.12" x 7.62" | Paperback 

Culinary Claims explores the complex relationships between wild plants and introduced animals, Indigenous foodways, and Canadian regulations. Blending food studies with environmental history, the book examines how cuisines reflect social and political issues related to cultural representation, restaurants, and food sovereignty.

L. Sasha Gora chronicles the rise of Indigenous restaurants and their influence on Canadian food culture, engaging with questions about how shifts in appetite reflect broader shifts in imaginations of local environments and identities. Drawing on a diverse range of sources – from recipes and menus to artworks and television shows – the book discusses both historical and contemporary representations of Indigenous foodways and how they are changing amid the relocalization of food systems.

Culinary Claims tells a new story of settler colonialism and Indigenous resistance, emphasizing the critical role that restaurants play in Canada’s cultural landscape. It investigates how food shapes our understanding of place and the politics that underpin this relationship. Ultimately, the book asks, What insights can historians gain from restaurants – and their legacies – as reflections of Indigenous and settler negotiations over cultural claims to land?

Educator Information
Subjects: Business; History / Canadian History; History / Business & Economic History; Food Studies / Food in History; Indigenous Studies / Indigenous History

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Preface

Introduction: You Are Welcome
1. Agricultural Flagpoles
2. From Trains to Tundra
3. Restaurants and Representation
4. An Edible Exhibition
5. One Address, Three Restaurants
6. A Meal for a Chief
7. Culinary Resurgence
8. Seal Tartare
9. Where the Beaver and Buffalo Roam
10. Salmon and the F-Word
Conclusion: The North

Acknowledgements
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Additional Information
392 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | 34 illustrations | Paperback

A singular collection of responses to the still life paintings of acclaimed artist David Garneau

Dark Chapters brings together 17 poets, fiction writers, curators, and critics to engage with the works of David Garneau, the Governor General’s Award-winning Métis artist. Featuring paintings from Garneau’s still life series “Dark Chapters” alongside poetry, fiction, critical analysis, and autotheory, the book includes contributions from Fred Wah, Paul Seesequasis, Jesse Wente, Lillian Allen, Billy-Ray Belcourt, Larissa Lai, Susan Musgrave, and more.

A nod to the Reports of Truth and Reconciliation Commission, in which Justice Murray Sinclair describes the residential school system as “one of the darkest, most troubling chapters in our nation’s history,” Garneau’s still life paintings combine common objects (books, bones, teacups, mirrors) and less familiar ones (a Métis sash, a stone hammer, a braid of sweetgrass) to reflect the complexity of contemporary Indigenous experiences. Provocative titles like “Métis in the Academy” and “Smudge Before Reading” invite consideration of the mixed influences and loyalties faced by Indigenous students and scholars. Other paintings explore colonialism, vertical and lateral violence, Christian influence on traditional knowledge, and museum treatment of Indigenous belongings.

Rooted in Garneau’s life-long engagement at the intersections of visual art and writing, Dark Chapters presents a multifaceted reflection on the work of an inimitable, unparalleled artist.

Includes contributions from Arin Fay, Billy-Ray Belcourt, Cecily Nicholson, David Howes, Dick Averns, Fred Wah, Jeff Derksen, Jesse Wente, John G. Hampton, Larissa Lai, Lillian Allen, Paul Seesequasis, Peter Morin, Rita Bouvier, Susan Musgrave, Tarene Thomas, and Trevor Herriot.

Reviews
“A smart collection of art and essays, Dark Chapters activates deep conversations about art, resistance, and sovereignty. Visiting with paintings by Métis artist David Garneau, seventeen poets, curators, and thinkers offer complex provocations that trouble and activate new forms of communities and relationships.” —Dr. Carmen Robertson, Canada Research Chair in North American Indigenous Visual and Material Culture
 
“Provocative, probing, and precarious, Dark Chapters pairs the poetic, literary, political, and critical responses of seventeen authors with the deceptively uncluttered yet gravid and combustible still lifes of David Garneau. This collection of pictures and words undertakes a necessary examination of the uncanny oppositions and disquieting literal and symbolic inversions that signify and animate the Indigenous history of Canada.” —Bonnie Devine
 
“Dark Chapters is a lesson in relationality and innovation. Built through conversations between Garneau’s work and artists/writers, the intergenerational contributors to this book come together in relation to Garneau and his still lives to explore the important contribution the artist has made to Canadian, Indigenous, and International art.” —Erin Sutherland

Educator Information
Table of Contents

Foreword
Nic Wilson

Still Life
John G. Hampton

Stone and Rock: I Have Failed You
Peter Morin

Wander Carried
Cecily Nicholson

On Kinship
Paul Seesequasis

Learning from Indigenous Academic Solidarity
Jeff Derksen

Knock Knock
Lillian Allen

Unsettling the Colonial Gaze
Trevor Herriot

Smudge Before Reading and The Land Does Not Forget
Tarene Thomas

Confession (after David Garneau) by Rita Bouvier

Fuse and Formal and Informal Education
Jesse Wente

The Problem with Pleasure
Billy-Ray Belcourt

Métis Realism: On the Materiality of Smoke and Relationality of Rocks
David Howes

Allies (after Hsieh and Montano)
Larissa Lai

Ally Tear Reliquary
Arin Fay

Understanding Attempted Enlightening: Between Language as Power…and Light as Life
Dick Averns

Spine
Fred Wah

The Resting Heartbeat of a Wounded Bird
Susan Musgrave

Gallery
About the Artist
About the Curator
About the Editor
About the Contributors
List of Artworks
Index

Additional Information
160 pages | 6.50" x 9.50" | 58 colour illustrations | Paperback 

This book invites readers to step into a space of reflection on your personal relationship with truth, reconciliation, and Orange Shirt Day.

Written in response to the increase of residential school denialism, Phyllis Webstad and Kristy McLeod have collaborated to create a book that encourages readers to face their own biases. This book challenges readers through a series of sensitive conversations that explore decolonization, Indigenization, healing, and every person’s individual responsibility to truth and reconciliation. Centered around the Orange Shirt Day movement, and a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, these conversations encourage readers to unpack and reckon with denialism, biases, privilege, and the journey forward, on both a personal and national level.

Within each chapter, Phyllis Webstad draws on her decade of experience (sharing her Orange Shirt Story on a global level and advocating for the rights of Indigenous Peoples) to offer insights on these topics and stories from her personal journey, which co-author and Métis scholar, Kristy McLeod, helps readers to further navigate. Each section includes real denialist comments taken from social media and Kristy's analysis and response to them. Through empathy-driven truth-telling, this book offers an opportunity to witness, reflect, heal, and be intentional about the seeds we hope to plant for the future, together.

Additional Information
350 pages | 5.70" x 8.25" | Hardcover

Reconciliation, as set out by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, is a process of understanding the Canadian state's genocide against Indigenous Peoples and creating a new relationship between Indigenous Peoples and settlers based on mutual respect and dignity. Given the racism and paternalism embedded in the Canadian state and related institutions, building such a relationship is a monumental task, but in addition, there is a major structural roadblock in the way: federalism, the political system that organizes Canadian governance.

Divided Power argues that Canada’s system of federalism, rooted in settler colonialism, has dispossessed Indigenous Peoples for settler benefit. Far from being a neutral, balanced way to distribute responsibilities and powers, the division between the state and provinces and territories obstructs Indigenous Peoples’ agency and governance. Under such coercive political exclusion, how can truth and reconciliation be fully achieved? Emily Grafton meticulously traces the ways that federalism limits the potential for reconciliation and proposes alternative power-sharing models.

Guiding readers through the terrain of debate, Grafton deftly and accessibly merges a political analysis of federalism with a clear assessment of settler colonialism to argue that reconciliation will be incomplete for as long as the current division of powers persists. Divided Power points to a promising approach to holding the Canadian state responsible for integrating the principles of truth and reconciliation into its very foundation.

Reviews
“Emily Grafton explores Canadian federalism – not the usual division of powers between the federal and provincial governments, but between the colonized and the colonizer. Federalism, Grafton argues, was informed by Indigenous political frameworks but has been torqued by colonial assumptions about Indigenous inferiority so as to require colonial dominance and Indigenous subordination. This book is a useful antidote to the complacent endorsement of the settler state status quo, so prevalent in scholarship and in politics.” - Joyce Green, Ktunaxa Nation, Professor Emerita, University of Regina; Elder-Auntie, CPSA Reconciliation Committee

“Grafton exposes the evolution and coloniality of Canadian federalism in its unjust and mundane efforts to diminish Indigenous sovereignties. Divided Power is a tour de force of alternatives, and you’ll never think of federalism the same way after reading it!” - Ajay Parasram, author of Pluriversal Sovereignty and the State

Additional Information
192 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Paperback

The central theme of this poetry collection revolves around the idea that each individual is shaped by the connections they forge with others throughout their lives. Each poem serves as a tribute to the relationships that influence us, weaving a rich tapestry of shared experiences and emotions. The collection is guiding readers through a journey of reflection and introspection. Each poem follows a distinct outline: it begins with a cherished memory that encapsulates the essence of the relationship, then delves into the significance of that bond and what it has taught us. Next, the poems explore the evolution of these connections—whether they have transformed, faded away, or remain vibrant in our lives. As the verses unfold, they evoke sensory reminders of these individuals—objects, places, or moments that bring them to mind—while also celebrating the qualities we admire in them. The poems culminate in a heartfelt exploration of their lasting impact on our identities and the permanent marks they leave behind. Each poem becomes a mirror, inviting readers to consider their own relationships and the intricate ways in which these connections shape who they are. Through this collection, we are reminded that we are, in many ways, a mosaic of everyone we have loved, learned from, and lost along the way.

Educator & Series Information
This book is part of the Modern Indigenous Voices series.

Additional Information
96 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback 

A bold, refreshing, and darkly funny debut novel about a mixed-ancestry Mi'kmaw woman balancing academia, grief, love, and new motherhood, for fans of Fleabag and Amanda Peters.

When the tides in the Cobequid Bay went out and left stretches of mudflats, I could walk halfway to the other shore. Sometimes the mud engulfed my feet, right up to my ankles, and made it hard to move. The longer you stayed stuck, the harder it was to keep going.

Charlie Francis's five-year plan has gone to shit. She was supposed to greet the new millennium by diving head-first into a master's degree, but her thesis has ground to a halt, Y2K was a bust, her rambunctious family and claustrophobic hometown are driving her around the bend—and the maybe-love-of-her-life, Adam, keeps joking about her moving home to marry him and have his babies.

When Charlie's beloved uncle—the same person who told her to get out of town and never look back—dies suddenly, Charlie leans into her independence, breaking Adam's heart and rushing headlong into an academic career despite the baked-in racism of the predominantly white institution. When she unexpectedly becomes pregnant, she has to navigate being a (mostly) single mother on top of everything else.

Charlie finds herself at a crossroads—and only so much stress-baking can keep reality at bay. How can she reconcile being a student of history within the colonial system that exploited her ancestors? How can she be a good mother when she can barely afford groceries? And how can she be a proud Mi'kmaw woman when the world seems determined to keep her down?

Maybe it's time for a new five-year plan.

With grit, humour, a lovable cast, and the nostalgia of the early aughts, this bold and refreshing novel from a powerful new voice in Indigenous fiction explores grief, the complex bonds of family, and cultural identity.

Additional Information
320 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback 

In this extraordinary and inspiring debut memoir, Jesse Thistle, once a high school dropout and now a rising Indigenous scholar, chronicles his life on the streets and how he overcame trauma and addiction to discover the truth about who he is.

If I can just make it to the next minute... then I might have a chance to live; I might have a chance to be something more than just a struggling crackhead.

From the Ashes is a remarkable memoir about hope and resilience, and a revelatory look into the life of a Métis-Cree man who refused to give up.

Abandoned by his parents as a toddler, Jesse Thistle briefly found himself in the foster-care system with his two brothers, cut off from all they had known. Eventually the children landed in the home of their paternal grandparents, but their tough-love attitudes meant conflicts became commonplace. And the ghost of Jesse’s drug-addicted father haunted the halls of the house and the memories of every family member. Struggling, Jesse succumbed to a self-destructive cycle of drug and alcohol addiction and petty crime, spending more than a decade on and off the streets, often homeless. One day, he finally realized he would die unless he turned his life around.

In this heartwarming and heartbreaking memoir, Jesse Thistle writes honestly and fearlessly about his painful experiences with abuse, uncovering the truth about his parents, and how he found his way back into the circle of his Indigenous culture and family through education.

An eloquent exploration of what it means to live in a world surrounded by prejudice and racism and to be cast adrift, From the Ashes is, in the end, about how love and support can help one find happiness despite the odds.

Awards

• 2020 Indigenous Voices Awards Winner for Published Prose in English
  
• Winner, Kobo Emerging Writer Prize Nonfiction
• Winner, High Plains Book Awards
• An Indigo Book of the Year 

Reviews
“From the Ashes hits you like a punch in the gut. It’s an unflinching, heartrending and beautifully written story of survival against seemingly impossible odds. But it’s also a book that should make you furious. Thistle paints a vivid portrait of a country seemingly incapable of doing right by Indigenous youth or by those struggling with homelessness, addiction and intergenerational trauma. That he survived to tell this story is truly a miracle. Still, one question haunts me after finishing this powerful and devastating book: How do we ensure that the next generation isn’t forced to navigate a broken system that takes their lives for granted and fails them at every turn? My greatest hope, then, is that From the Ashes will be the wakeup call Canada needs.” — IAN MOSBY, historian and author of Food Will Win the War

Educator Information
Caution: Deals with mature subject matter.

Additional Information
368 pages | 6.00" x 9.00"

Growing up on the Nipissing First Nation reserve in Northern Ontario, Christian Allaire wanted to work in the fashion industry, a future that seemed like a remote, and unlikely, dream

He was first introduced to style and design through his culture’s traditional Ojibwe powwow regalia—ribbon skirts, beaded belts, elaborate headdresses. But as a teenager, he became transfixed by the high-fashion designs and runway shows that he saw on Fashion Television and in the pages of Vogue.

His unwavering interest in fashion led him to complete a journalism degree so he could pursue his goal of becoming a full-time fashion writer. After landing his first big magazine job in New York City, Allaire found himself working at the epicentre of the international fashion industry. His dream had come true. Yet he soon realized the fashion world—and his place in it—wasn’t always quite as glamorous as he imagined it would be.

From grinding as an unpaid intern, to becoming a glitzy (but overworked) fashion editor, Allaire writes with feeling about the struggle to find his place—and community—in the highly exclusive world of fashion. And he recounts, with great candour, the difficulty of balancing his ambitions with the often-inaccurate perceptions—including his own—of his culture’s place in the realm of fashion.

Full of joy, honesty, adversity, and great clothes, From the Rez to the Runway is a gripping memoir about how to achieve your dreams—and elevate others—while always remaining true to yourself.

Reviews
“Christian is a gift. He embodies the precious intersection between arts and advocacy, and is a truly grounded and inspired human being. In having such a curated, unique and sharp eye for both classic and cutting edge design, coupled with an unshakable commitment to elevating Indigenous designers, he has carved a necessary space which elevates Indian Country and the world of fashion as a whole. A true game changer whose impact will be seen and felt for generations.” — Lily Gladstone, Oscar-nominated actor

Funny, honest and utterly charming, From the Rez to the Runway lends the cliche fashion editor origin story a refreshing new perspective. With a true sense of passion and wide-eyed wonder, Christian Allaire pursues his personal quest for creativity, purpose and self-discovery and finds that staying true to one’s self brings the greatest rewards. Brimming with moving family memories from the reservation and hilarious fashion misadventures alike, the book is a must-read for all the so-called outsiders and misfits who’ve ever dared to follow their dreams. — Chioma Nnadi, Head of Editorial Content, British Vogue

From beadwork to Burberry, Christian Allaire is a force in fashion. He paints a portrait of a complicated industry rarely seen behind the scenes — let alone traversed by Indigenous writers. In this compelling and inspiring memoir, Allaire details how he carries community with him through every glass ceiling he shatters. His work, and this memoir, are a triumph. After all, ‘Don’t mess with a rez kid.’  — Devery Jacobs, Filmmaker and Actor, Reservation Dogs

There is a new generation of Fashion Transformers and Christian Allaire is leading the movement. Allaire has been chosen by spirit to shine a light on Indigenous Fashion and Art, and he has done so at the highest levels, from New York to Paris, and all around the world. He is a door opener for the truth, power, and beauty of true fashion and its creators. — Kelly Cutrone, founder of People’s Revolution and New York Times bestselling author

Additional Information
272 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Paperback

From veteran hockey reporter Patrick Johnston and Gino’s longtime friend Peter Leech comes the authorized biography of Gino Odjick.

In the 1980s and ’90s, National Hockey League games were very different from the nimble, skill-focused displays we see today. One of the greatest differences—and one of the sport’s more popular facets at the time—was the widespread presence of “enforcers”: hulking, battle-scarred players whose main task was to police the sport by chasing down and brawling with opponents who had broken unwritten codes determining which aspects of violence counted as dishonorable or unjustified.

When hard-hitting Vancouver Canucks player Gino Odjick emerged in the early 1990s, he quickly became one of the game’s most feared enforcers and revered teammates, a sign of a new era for the team, racking up 296 penalty minutes in the 45 games he played in his rookie season. Hailing from Kitigan Zibi, an Algonquin community near Maniwaki, Quebec, Gino was one of the few Indigenous players in the NHL at the time. But it was Gino’s ferocious play contrasted by his genuinely affable and openhearted personality off the ice that won him a special place in the hearts of Canucks supporters.

Yet legends often obscure the human stories behind them. Patrick Johnston and Peter Leech look beyond Gino’s legendary persona, drawing on insights from family members, friends, and teammates to recount Gino’s early years in a loving household that was always ready to welcome foster children. Gino’s father, Joe, had suffered the lonely traumas of the residential school system, and the experience had instilled a commitment in the family to those who were less fortunate.

The book also details Gino’s eventual struggles with alcohol abuse, and how he responded by taking on the role of empathetic mentor to young Indigenous people, travelling from community to community to hear their stories and offer hope. He never wavered in this role, even as he confronted serious illnesses, including chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) and the rare blood disorder that he survived for years longer than expected, but that eventually led to his death at age fifty-two.

Gino is a moving tribute to a beloved hockey legend.

Reviews
"Gino was the greatest teammate; he had such a huge heart and knew his role better than anyone in the league. Gino loved being a Vancouver Canuck and gave back to the community in so many ways. He will be greatly missed by his family, friends, and fans. This book will give people insight into his remarkable life."—Geoff Courtnall

“Gino provides a compelling account of the life of a beloved Vancouver Canuck. From his humble beginnings in Quebec to NHL stardom and beyond, Odjick was dedicated to the well-being of teammates and the Indigenous community. This is an excellent tribute to an exceptional man.”—Randi Druzin, author of Between the Pipes and Behind the Mask

Additional Information
288 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | b&w insert | Hardcover