The Lake in the Middle of Townby Neil Sawatzky; Illustrated by Julio SalazarPublished by Your Nickel’s Worth PublishingReview by Sally Meadows$24.95 ISBN 9781778690402 When you do a Google search for things to see in Regina, Saskatchewan, Wascana Park consistently comes up in the top five. With easy access to other popular tourist attractions such as the Royal Saskatchewan Museum, the Saskatchewan Science Centre, and the Mackenzie Art Gallery, Wascana Park shines as a beautiful green space surrounding picturesque Wascana Lake. Residents and tourists alike marvel at its beauty. But what is the history behind this “sparkling gem in the Queen City’s crown?” An updated, hardcover, 20th anniversary edition of The Lake in the Middle of Town dives into this question both as an easy-to-read poem perfect for inter-generational snuggles and with sidebar information for older children and adults who want to dig deeper into the lake’s fascinating history. Although I didn’t grow up in Saskatchewan, my mother was born in Regina, so this book really opened my eyes up to the historical depth and breadth of this iconic area in Saskatchewan’s capital in a personal way. From its Indigenous roots to the first appearance of settlers to the establishment and…

Where’s Johnny?: The Tale of a Lost Catby Lori Burton, Illustrated by Wendi NordellPublished by Your Nickel’s Worth PublishingReview by Sally Meadows$19.95 ISBN 9781778690419 Johnny, the big Maine Coon cat, had a perfect life. He was well loved by his family of four, and he loved them back. But when Johnny and his family move to a new neighbourhood, it sets off a chain of events that none of them could have seen coming. As a house cat, Johnny was used to being inside all the time. But curiosity gets the best of him in his new surroundings. When Mom removes a window screen to clean it, Johnny sees his chance. He jumps onto the windowsill and out the window, eager to experience his first taste of freedom. His elation is short-lived. Within seconds, Big Dog comes bounding towards him and chases Johnny right out of the neighbourhood. Johnny soon realizes he is completely lost. What ensues is a long journey with unexpected twists and turns as Johnny tries to get back to the people he loves. Along the way he meets a cast of diverse characters, both human and animal—some kind and others not—as he navigates challenging, even perilous,…

ABC…Yes, You Can!by Florence Mudzongo, illustrated by Josiah TaundiPublished by Your Nickel Worth’s PublishingReview by Michelle Shaw$19.95 ISBN 9781778690372 While it is addressed to Black girls, ABC…Yes, You Can! is a gorgeous book that feels like a gift to little girls everywhere. In simple ABC format, it highlights a huge variety of careers and encourages little girls to dream big dreams. The careers cover a huge range, from aeronautical engineer, to DJ and speech pathologist to truck driver. Best of all, it spotlights specific women in each particular field – all of whom are of African descent. Even though I was born and brought up in South Africa, there are so many names that I didn’t recognise, names such as world-class aeronautical engineer, Winifred Byanyima from Uganda and Clémentine Zeregbe Goli, the only female heavy-duty truck driver from the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire. The book also includes women such as Sahle-Work Zewede, president of Ethiopia, legendary South African musician Yvonne Chaka Chaka and biologist Dr. Wangari Maathai from Kenya who was the first African woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize. There are also women from America and Canada such as web developer Sofia Ongele, who created her first award-winning…

A Ticket to the Grand Show: Journeys Across Cultural Boundariesby Neil McKinnonPublished by Your Nickel’s Worth PublishingReview by Toby A. Welch  $29.95 ISBN 9781778690235 Wow! What a fascinating book! I didn’t even need to dig into chapter one to get hooked; the introduction itself sucked me right in and I couldn’t put A Ticket to the Grand Show down.  McKinnon is insistent that this is not a travel book, more like a story collection of cultural experiences in his life. But I loved reading about the places he visited and the encounters he had in them. The book is more about the culture in the places he traveled to than a list of things to do. “Culture” is a multi-layered concept that cannot be adequately explored in a brief five hundred words. It means different things to different people. Culture is often a deeply buried belief that someone may not even consciously be aware of having. A Ticket to the Grand Show is broken into five parts, each one detailing a geographic location: China, Japan, Mexico, Hawaii, and Canada. Some of McKinnon’s experiences took place decades ago but under his skillful hand, they feel like they happened yesterday.  While I enjoyed reading all five parts, my favourite was…

Tanning Moosehides the Northern Saskatchewan Trapline Way: An Easy Step-by-Step GuideWritten by Tommy Bird, Lawrence Adam, Lena Adam, with Miriam KörnerPhotos by Miriam Körner and Tommy BirdPublished by YNWPReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$49.95 ISBN 9781778690327 In these modern times, when we want information our “Go To” is usually to Google or Youtube it. If one wanted to learn to tan moosehides, for example, they could indeed go online to discover how, but some steps might be missed. If tanning moosehides is indeed your intent, now there’s an excellent resource that you can hold in your hands or spread on a table: Tanning Moosehides the Northern Saskatchewan Trapline Way: An Easy Step-by-Step Guide. The softcover guidebook by northern Saskatchewan residents Tommy Bird, Lawrence Adam, Lena Adam, and award-winning La Ronge writer Miriam Körner takes readers through the twenty-four steps involved in the time-consuming process of tanning moosehides, “a skill passed down from generation to generation since time immemorial”. The book is filled with colour photographs provided by Miriam Körner and Tommy Bird, and it begins with a helpful introduction. If you’re from the north, you may already know the various uses of tanned moosehide. They were and are “sewn into mukluks,…

“nēhiyawēwin awāsi-masinahikanis: A Little Plains Cree Book for Children: A Reference for Teaching the Plains Cree Language”by Patricia Deiter, Allen J. (A.J.) Felix and Elmer BallantynePlains Cree Translations by Elmer Ballantyne, Inez Deiter, May Desnomie, Allen J. (A.J.) Felix and Joslyn WuttuneePublished by YNWPReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$74.95 ISBN 9781778690044 I recently reviewed awāsi-nēhiyawēwin masinahikanis: A Little Plains Cree Colouring Book—Plains Cree People, by Saskatchewan’s Patricia Deiter, Allen J. (A.J.) Felix, and Elmer Ballantyne. The colouring book complements the learned trio’s reference guide for teaching the Plains Cree language, nēhiyawēwin awāsi-masinahikanis—A Little Plains Cree Book for Children, which I have also now read and learned from. “Plains Cree is spoken in 43 First Nations communities in Saskatchewan alone,” and the authors hope is that they, “as Plains Cree people, will still have [their] language for [their] future generations”. In her opening acknowledgements, Deiter (White Buffalo Woman)—a “non-fluent Plains Cree speaker” and English teacher—extends gratitude to the six Elders who “provided the majority of Plains Cree translations” for the reference guide, including her mother, Inez Deiter, “who provides ongoing support for [her daughter’s] efforts to restore the Cree language to our youth”. The reference book follows the themes established in the…

awāsi-nēhiyawēwin masinahikanis: A Little Plains Cree Colouring Book—Plains Cree Peopleby Patricia Deiter, Allen J. (A.J.) Felix, and Elmer BallantyneIllustrated by Aleigha AgecoutayPublished by YNWPReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$24.95 ISBN 9781778690136 It’s been said that when a language dies, a culture goes with it. In Canada several Indigenous languages are in fact endangered, but the one I grew up hearing in northern Saskatchewan—Cree—remains one of the most widely spoken Indigenous languages in the country. Still, it’s important to continue teaching it so Cree youth can connect with their ancestors, their history, and cultural traditions. I’ll add that it’s also a fine idea for anyone who lives in northern communities to learn at least a few words of Cree; my parents took classes because they lived alongside and worked with Plains Cree people. I picked up a small vocabulary, as well, mostly from friends who lived on Flying Dust First Nation. I’m glad that there are educators, Elders, and Knowledge Keepers who continue to find creative ways to make learning Plains Cree fun for children. Patricia Deiter, Allen J. (A.J.) Felix, and Elmer Ballantyne, the three Saskatchewan writers of awāsi-nēhiyawēwin masinahikanis: A Little Plains Cree Colouring Book—Plains Cree People, have done just…

The Treasure Boxby Judith SilverthornePublished by Your Nickel’s Worth PublishingReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$19.95 ISBN 9781988783888 The Treasure Box is the fourth Judith Silverthorne novel I’ve read during my decades as a book reviewer, and again, this Regina-based writer has mesmerized me. I reviewed Silverthorne’s middle years’ novel, Convictions, in 2016, and must reiterate what I wrote about that novel, as it absolutely also applies to The Treasure Box: “This is extremely competent writing, and what’s more, it’s a story that’s hard to put down.” Silverthorne’s credible and likeable ten-year-old narrator, Augustus Ludwig (aka Gus), has just reluctantly moved from Calgary to Regina after his parents’ split. Now Gus, sister Hannah and Mom have moved in with Grandad, who is suffering from intermittent memory loss, and will soon be transitioning into a seniors’ home. It’s a lot, but there’s more. At school Gus becomes the target of “serious bonehead” Connor and his gang of “top dogs,” who mock his name and make school miserable, but their teacher, Mrs. Redmar, has given the class a family history assignment that may change everything for empathetic Gus … his curiosity about his own ancestors, his acceptance of the move, and even his thoughts…

The Star Poems: A Cree Sky Narrative/acâhkos nikamowini-pîkiskwêwina: nêhiyawi-kîsik âcimowin”by Jesse Rae Archibald-BarberPublished by Your Nickel’s Worth PublishingReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$24.95 ISBN 9781778690174 It’s innovative, bilingual, and gives us another kind of Genesis. The Star Poems: A Cree Sky Narrative/acâhkos nikamowini-pîkiskwêwina: nêhiyawi-kîsik âcimowin is a Cree/English poetry collection by Jesse Rae Archibald-Barber, a Regina writer, editor and professor of Indigenous Literatures at the First Nations University of Canada. Archibald-Barber has ingeniously combined traditional Indigenous creation stories—The Star stories—with quantum physics, and the result is a star-studded collection of eye-opening poems. The author essentially contemporizes Cree oral tradition stories (that “teach us how we are all related to Creation through the same source of energy and spirit”) by spinning them into poems that merge with the “spiritual and scientific understandings of the cosmos and the quantum foundations of reality”. He cites Blackfoot scholar Leroy Little Bear’s talk on quantum physics and Indigenous spirituality as a major inspiration, particularly Little Bear’s discussion on “how the quantum superstrings are what Indigenous cultures have traditionally called spirit”. He also laud’s Cree educator Wilfred Buck’s video, “Legend of the Star People,” which describes the “Hole-in-the-Sky—a ‘spatial anomaly’ or a ‘wormhole’ that leads to and…

Lost Treasure on the Circle Star Ranchby Jackie Cameron, Illustrated by Wendi NordellPublished by Your Nickel’s Worth PublishingReview by Sally Meadows$19.95 ISBN 9781778690013 In Lost Treasure on the Circle Star Ranch, nine-year-old Ben stumbles across yet another mystery as readers get a glimpse of life on his family’s ranch on the Canadian prairies. The story draws the reader in immediately with a vivid visual of two horses gallopping across the prairies, their riders-Ben and his sister Sarah-shouting about a grass fire. Ben’s family springs into action. The appearance of a stranger in a blue truck who helps put out the fire raises Ben’s curiosity. When he learns from a Hutterite neighbour that there had been another grass fire years ago near an abandoned cabin on his family’s rented land, and that the fire might have been connected to a thief using the cabin as a hideout, Ben’s imagination goes into overdrive. Could the stolen money and jewellery still be at the cabin? And could the mysterious man in the blue truck, who Ben spots again later at the rodeo, be on the hunt for the lost treasure? Swift Current author Jackie Cameron effectively weaves details about life on a ranch-the danger…