Author(s): Tanya Talaga

Politics | Ethnicity, Race and Identity | Snips

The world's Indigenous communities are fighting to live and dying too young. In this vital and incisive work, Tanya Talaga explores intergenerational trauma and the alarming rise of youth suicide. From Northern Ontario to Nunavut, Norway, Brazil, Australia, and the United States, the Indigenous experience in colonised nations is startlingly similar and deeply disturbing. It is an experience marked by the violent separation of Peoples from the land, the separation of families, and the separation of individuals from traditional ways of life - all of which has culminated in a spiritual separation that has had an enduring impact on generations of Indigenous children. As a result of this colonial legacy, too many communities today lack access to the basic determinants of health - income, employment, education, a safe environment, health services - leading to a mental health and youth suicide crisis on a global scale. But, Talaga reminds us, First Peoples also share a history of resistance, resilience, and civil rights activism, from the Occupation of Alcatraz led by the Indians of All Tribes, to the Northern Ontario Stirland Lake Quiet Riot, to the Standing Rock protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline, which united Indigenous Nations from across Turtle Island in solidarity. All Our Relations is a powerful call for action, justice, and a better, more equitable world for all Indigenous Peoples. 'An essential work of nonfiction . . . Through storytelling, on-the-ground reporting, literature surveys, and plenty of statistics, Talaga demonstrates the extent to which Indigenous children continue to live under the full weight of colonial history . . . All children, she writes, 'need to know who their ancestors are, who their heroes and villains are.' In All Our Relations, Talaga restores that basic right to Indigenous children who have been robbed of it. And the rest of us, as an epigraph from author Thomas King makes clear, no longer have the excuse of saying we haven't heard this story. Talaga alone has told it twice now.' -Quill & Quire Praise for Seven Fallen Feathers- 'An urgent and unshakable portrait of the horrors faced by Indigenous teens going to school in Thunder Bay, Ontario, far from their homes and families . . . Talaga's incisive research and breathtaking storytelling could bring this community one step closer to the healing it deserves.' -Booklist, Starred Review Praise for Seven Fallen Feathers- 'Talaga's research is meticulous and her journalistic style is crisp and uncompromising . . . The book is heartbreaking and infuriating, both an important testament to the need for change and a call to action.' -Publishers Weekly Starred Review

Author Biography: Tanya Talaga is the acclaimed author of Seven Fallen Feathers, a multi-award winner including the RBC Taylor Prize, the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing, and the First Nation Communities READ- Young Adult/Adult Award. The book was a finalist for the Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Nonfiction Prize and the BC National Award for Nonfiction. Talaga was the 2018 CBC Massey Lecturer, and is the author of the US bestseller All Our Relations. For more than twenty years she has been a journalist at the Toronto Star. Talaga is of Polish and Ojibwe descent. Her grandmother is a member of Fort William First Nation. She lives in Toronto with her two teenage children.