- October 24, 2015
Winnipeg launch of Night Moves: Stories (Great Plains Publications) and A Blanket of Butterflies (HighWater Press, an imprint of Portage & Main Press) and Mini Aodla Freeman’s Life Among the Qallunaat (University of Manitoba Press), edited by Julie Rak.
When: Saturday, October 24, 7:00 p.m.
Where: McNally Robinson Booksellers (1120 Grant Avenue), Winnipeg.
Cost: FREE
As a window into the pain and potential of the Northwest Territories, Richard Van Camp’s fourth short story collection is both hilarious and heartbreaking. Night Moves continues to explore the disparate lives of indigenous characters introduced in his previous work.
A Blanket of Butterflies explores the journey of Shinobu, a mysterious stranger who visits Fort Smith, NWT, to retrieve his family’s samurai suit of armor and sword from the local museum. When he discovers that his grandfather’s sword has been lost in a poker game to the man they call “Benny the Bank,” he sets out to retrieve it, with the help of a young boy, Sonny, and his grandmother. Together, they face Benny and his men, a meeting that changes them all. This graphic novel, beautifully illustrated by Scott B. Henderson, explores the grace of family and the power of a great mystery.
Richard Van Camp is an internationally renowned storyteller and bestselling author based in Edmonton. His previous work includes Angel Wing Splash Pattern, The Lesser Blessed, The Moon of Letting Go, and Godless but Loyal to Heaven.
Life Among the Qallunaat is the story of Mini Aodla Freeman’s experiences growing up in the Inuit communities of James Bay and her journey in the 1950s from her home to the strange land and stranger customs of the Qallunaat, those living south of the Arctic. Her extraordinary story, sometimes humorous and sometimes heartbreaking, illustrates an Inuit woman’s movement between worlds and ways of understanding. It also provides a clear-eyed record of the changes that swept through Inuit communities in the 1940s and 1950s. This new critical edition includes an afterword by Keavy Martin and Julie Rak, with Norma Dunning.
Mini Aodla Freeman is an author, playwright, and translator born on Cape Hope Island in James Bay, Nunavut. Julie Rak is a professor in the Department of English and Film Studies at the University of Alberta.
