Hi there, dear reader,
Do you read many books written by women authors? I used to think I did, but once I started keeping track of what I read (back in 2016), I realized that I was over-estimating how much of what I read was written by women.
That got me to thinking. Who is writing the books that get mentioned in top 10 of the year lists, in famous peoples’ book clubs lists, in well-respected newspapers and magazines? Look into it, it’s mostly white people, and often men. I was reading too many of those books.
Once I started paying attention to who was writing the books I was reading, it was pretty easy to adjust what I was reading to hear from a wider range of voices. Don’t know where to start? It’s as easy as making the next book you read be a book from my suggestions below.
This dispatch includes really good novels written by Indigenous women. Most of the authors are Canadian, but not all. A few are so good that I can’t believe they weren’t bestsellers. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did, and please share the ones you like with your friends.
All the links below link to Massy Books, a 100% Indigenous owned and operated book store in Vancouver, BC that I discovered through my dear friend Michelle. Please consider purchasing directly from Massy Books. They have all the books in my dispatches and they ship to anywhere.
Let’s get into it, bookworms!
“The Break” by Katherena Vermette
This is the book that will elicit all kinds of emotions from you, from deeply penetrating sadness, to searing rage. It’s so well written, and the characters are so real, so vivid, the whole book is totally unforgettable. It’s a sorrowful tale. I still think about this book often.
Eden Robinson’s Trickster Trilogy - Start with “Son of a Trickster”
This is the series that will change your mind about magic and about how a belief in communication that transcends time, place, life and death, and overall Western ideas of reality can be totally engrossing and enriching, without being campy or predictable. These stories are sophisticated, the characters are people you’ve never met but may find yourself deeply connected to.
Robinson so seamlessly blurs the lines between fiction, science fiction, and pure magic, that you find yourself totally immersed in the world she has created (even if you recognize some Vancouver neighbourhoods).
“Heartberries” by Terese Marie Mailhot
Poetic and thoughtful. This is technically a memoir, but I still wanted to include it here since this book really stayed with me. Here’s the author in her own words: “my work speaks to issues like murdered, missing indigenous women, and it's also giving humanity to experiences that women have where I'm from.” (NPR)
“Birdie” by Tracey Lindberg
This is the story about how a person moves forward and heals (whatever healing means, really) from a history of sexual violence. It’s a heavy topic, and a heavy book. There’s a warm and sometimes comedic side to the book, too. I loved how the characters’ names are changeable, in the same way that people are changeable and that time isn’t always linear.
Also this isn’t a factor in deciding to read this book, but I love the cover illustration.
“LaRose” & “The Night Watchman” by Louise Erdrich
Erdrich is American, but I wanted to slip in her books because I love them all so much. Ignore what you may have read about her tumultuous personal life, and choose from one of her many great novels, which depict regular people leading relatively regular lives. Fall in love with her characters. Brace for her exquisite telling of what love is, what relationships are like when they are succeeding, and when they fall apart. Become an Erdrich completionist. Start with “LaRose”, maybe. Or, read on…
Update: While I had this dispatch in my drafts, I read Erdrich’s newest Novel “The Night Watchman” and I can’t stress enough how much I enjoyed it.
Oh, do I love Louise Erdrich. This book... I had to savour it. I read it slowly, deliberately, taking in every part. This is a book about a clever and wonderful young woman who wants to find herself and take care of her family. About her mother who knows all the healing plants, but can only tell your their names in Cree. About a boxer named Wood Mountain. And trying to find a missing sister in the city. It's about the “Indian” experience in the US in the 1950s. It's also deeply political. It's about a man who brought about real change to prevent his People and other Tribes from being "Terminated" by the US government, which wanted to take their land despite concise, confirmed Treaties that were supposed to render that impossible. It's about people who are much more in tune with the world, with nature, and with each other than non-Native people are; where ghosts are characters and where owls are, too. This book is heavy reading but it's essential, important reading too.
The cover art is a take on the Northern Lights. Dreamy!
“Nobody Cries at Bingo” by Dawn Dumont
I love Dumont’s stories because they are funny, piercing portraits of life on the reservation, stories told like I’ve never heard them told before. Joyful, but deeply moving. The title is a pretty great summary of what the book is like: witty and original.
PS. I mentioned Dumont’s book “Glass Beads” in an earlier article.
Bonus: “Split Tooth” by Tanya Tagaq
This one isn’t a novel, per se! It’s half poetry, half memoir, half fiction, set in Nunavut by a renowned throat singer and political activist. If you don’t want to delve into the book, try Tagaq’s Twitter feed for scathing political insights, sass, and general signal boosting of Indigenous voices.
While I’m no expert on the subject of Indigenous literature or history, there are so many good books to share written by Indigenous authors in Canada (particularly women!). I wanted to share a few I loved in the hopes of helping you decide what you might like to read. That’s always been the mission behind these dispatches: to send you some ideas when you want good books to read.
Excited at the prospect of hearing what you think,
Vero