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The Other Side of Perfect [electronic resource] : by Florence, Melanie.aut; Scrimger, Richard.aut; cloudLibrary;
Two kids from two different worlds form an unexpected friendship in this lens into the interworking of empathy. Told in alternating narratives, The Other Side of Perfect is infused with themes of identity, belonging, and compassion, reminding us that we are all more than our circumstances, and we are all more connected than we think. Cody’s home life is a messy, too-often terrifying story of neglect and abuse. Cody himself is a smart kid, a survivor with a great sense of humor that helps him see past his circumstances and begin to try to get himself out. Autumn is a wealthy girl from an indigenous family, who has found herself in with the popular crowd even though it’s hard for her to want to keep up. But one night, while returning home from a movie, Autumn comes across Cody, face down in the laneway behind her house. All Cody knows is that he can’t take another encounter with his father like the one he just narrowly escaped. He can’t go home. But he doesn’t have anywhere else to go. When Autumn agrees to let him hide out in her dad’s art studio, Cody’s story begins to come out, and so does hers.
Subjects: Electronic books.; Physical & Emotional Abuse; Native American; Friendship;
© 2024., Scholastic Inc.,

Being home / by Sorell, Traci.; Goade, Michaela.;
On a day filled with anticipation, a young Cherokee girl bids farewell to her familiar city life and documents the changing landscape through drawings as her family moves to their ancestral land and embraces their new home.
Subjects: Picture books.; Moving, Household; Families; Cherokee Indians; Indigenous peoples; Home;

Carry : a memoir of survival on stolen land / by Jensen, Toni,author.;
"A powerful, poetic memoir about what it means to exist as an indigenous woman in America, told in snapshots of the author's encounters with gun violence--for readers of Jesmyn Ward and Terese Marie Mailhot. Toni Jensen grew up in the Midwest around guns: As a girl, she learned how to shoot birds with her father, a card-carrying member of the NRA. As an adult, she's had guns waved in her face in the fracklands around Standing Rock, and felt their silent threat on the concealed-carry campus where she teaches. And she has always known she is not alone. As a Métis woman, she is no stranger to the violence enacted on the bodies of indigenous women, on indigenous land, and the ways it is hidden, ignored, forgotten. In Carry, Jensen maps her personal experience onto the historical, exploring how history is lived in the body and redefining the language we use to speak about violence in America. In the title chapter, Jensen recalls the discrimination she faced in college as a Native American student from her roommate to her faculty adviser. "The Worry Line" explores the gun and gang violence in her neighborhood the year her daughter was born. "At the Workshop" focuses on her graduate school years, during which a classmate repeatedly wrote stories in which he killed thinly veiled versions of her. In "Women in the Fracklands," Jensen takes the reader inside Standing Rock during the Dakota Access pipeline protests, as well as the peril faced by women, in regions overcome by the fracking boom. In prose at once forensic and deeply emotional, Toni Jensen shows herself to be a brave new voice and a fearless witness to her own difficult history--as well as to the violent cultural landscape in which she finds her coordinates as a Native American woman. With each chapter, Carry reminds us that surviving in one's country is not the same as surviving one's country."--
Subjects: Biographies.; Jensen, Toni.; Métis women; Indigenous women activists; Indigenous women;

Bug / by Bonnell, Yolanda,1982-author.;
Includes bibliographical references."bug is a solo performance and artistic ceremony that highlights the ongoing effects of colonialism and intergenerational trauma experienced by Indigenous women. It is also a testimony to the women's resilience and strength. The Girl traces her life from surviving the foster care system to her struggles with addictions. She fights, hoping to break the cycle in order to give her daughter a different life than the one she had. The Mother sits in Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, recounting memories of the daughter that was taken from her, and the struggles of living on the streets in Northern Ontario. They are both followed by Manidoons, a physical manifestation of the trauma and addictions that crawl across generations. bug reveals the hard truths that many Indigenous women face as they carve out a space to survive in contemporary Canada, while holding on to so much hope."--
Subjects: Drama.; Indigenous women;

Waiting for the long night moon : stories / by Peters, Amanda,author.;
"In this intimate collection, Peters melds traditional storytelling with beautiful, spare prose to describe the dignity of the traditional way of life, the humiliations of systemic racism and the resilient power to endure. A young man returns from residential school only to realize he can no longer communicate with his own parents. A young woman finds purpose and healing on the front lines as a water protector. An old man remembers his life as he patiently waits for death. And a young girl nervously dances in her first Mawi'omi. The collection also includes the Indigenous Voices Award-nominated story "(Winter Arrives)." At times sad, sometimes disturbing but always redemptive, the stories in Waiting for the Long Night Moon will remind you that where there is grief there is also joy, where there is trauma there is resilience and, most importantly, there is power."--
Subjects: Short stories.; Indigenous peoples;

My heart is a chainsaw / by Jones, Stephen Graham,1972-author.;
"In her quickly gentrifying rural lake town Jade sees recent events only her encyclopedic knowledge of horror films could have prepared her for in this latest novel from the Jordan Peele of horror literature, Stephen Graham Jones. "Some girls just don't know how to die ..." Shirley Jackson meets Friday the 13th in My Heart Is a Chainsaw, written by the New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians Stephen Graham Jones, called "a literary master" by National Book Award winner Tananarive Due and "one of our most talented living writers" by Tommy Orange. Alma Katsu calls My Heart Is a Chainsaw "a homage to slasher films that also manages to defy and transcend genre." On the surface is a story of murder in small-town America. But beneath is its beating heart: a biting critique of American colonialism, Indigenous displacement, and gentrification, and a heartbreaking portrait of a broken young girl who uses horror movies to cope with the horror of her own life. Jade Daniels is an angry, half-Indian outcast with an abusive father, an absent mother, and an entire town that wants nothing to do with her. She lives in her own world, a world in which protection comes from an unusual source: horror movies ... especially the ones where a masked killer seeks revenge on a world that wronged them. And Jade narrates the quirky history of Proofrock as if it is one of those movies. But when blood actually starts to spill into the waters of Indian Lake, she pulls us into her dizzying, encyclopedic mind of blood and masked murderers, and predicts exactly how the plot will unfold. Yet, even as Jade drags us into her dark fever dream, a surprising and intimate portrait emerges ... a portrait of the scared and traumatized little girl beneath the Jason Voorhees mask: angry, yes, but also a girl who easily cries, fiercely loves, and desperately wants a home. A girl whose feelings are too big for her body. My Heart Is a Chainsaw is her story, her homage to horror and revenge and triumph"--
Subjects: Thrillers (Fiction); Horror films; Young women; Indigenous women; Murder;

Those Pink Mountain nights / by Ferguson, Jen,1985-author.;
"In her remarkable second novel following her Governor General's Award-winning debut, The Summer of Bitter and Sweet, Jen Ferguson writes about the hurt of a life stuck in past tense, the hum of connections that cannot be severed, and one week in a small, snowy town that changes everything. Overachievement isn't a bad word--for Berlin, it's the goal. She's securing excellent grades, planning her future, and working a part-time job at Pink Mountain Pizza, a legendary local business. Who says she needs a best friend by her side? Dropping out of high school wasn't smart--but it was necessary for Cameron. Since his cousin Kiki's disappearance, it's hard enough to find the funny side of life, especially when the whole town has forgotten Kiki. To them, she's just another missing Native girl. People at school label Jessie a tease, a rich girl--and honestly, she's both. But Jessie knows she contains multitudes. Maybe her new job crafting pizzas will give her the high-energy outlet she desperately wants. When the weekend at Pink Mountain Pizza takes several unexpected turns, all three teens will have to acknowledge the various ways they've been hurt--and how much they need each other to hold it all together. Jen Ferguson burst onto the YA scene with her first novel, which was a William C. Morris Award Finalist and a Stonewall Award Honor Book, and this second novel fulfills her promise as one of the most thoughtful and exciting YA writers today."--013+.Grades 10-12.
Subjects: Young adult fiction.; Novels.; Friendship; Indigenous peoples; Mental illness; Missing persons; Pizzerias; Small cities; Social classes; Teenagers; Friendship; Indigenous peoples; Mental illness; Missing persons; Pizzerias; Small cities; Social classes; Teenagers;

Searching for Savanna : the murder of one Native American woman and the violence against the many / by Gable, Mona,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."In the vein of Yellow Bird and Highway of Tears, a powerful and illuminating investigation into the disappearance of the young and pregnant Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind, highlighting the shocking epidemic of violence against Indigenous women in America and the country's deplorable inaction. In the summer of 2017, twenty-two-year-old Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind vanished. A week after the pregnant woman disappeared, police arrested the white couple who lived upstairs from Savanna and emerged from their apartment carrying an infant girl. The baby was Savanna's, but she would not be found until her body was pulled from the Red River days later. This horrifying and unimaginable crime sent shockwaves through the country and helped bring to light the overwhelming sexual and physical violence Native American women and girls have endured since the country's colonization. With pathos and respect, Searching for Savanna confronts the history and attitudes towards these women and why our government has turned its back on the countless victims by highlighting this specific tragic case. Featuring in-depth interviews, personal accounts, and trial analysis, this is much more than a true crime book, it is also a call to action for those who cannot speak for themselves"--
Subjects: True crime stories.; LaFontaine-Greywind, Savanna, 1995-2017.; Indigenous women; Indigenous women; Missing persons; Murder victims; Murder;

Berry Pickers, The A Novel - Indigenous Family's Tragic Loss And Unwavering Love [electronic resource] : by Peters, Amanda.aut; Warbus, Aaliya.nrt; Waunch, Jordan.nrt; cloudLibrary;
NATIONAL BESTSELLER WINNER 2023 BARNES & NOBLE DISCOVER PRIZE WINNER of the ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL for EXCELLENCE in FICTION WINNER Best First Novel, Crime Writers of Canada Award WINNER Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction FINALIST Amazon First Novel Award FINALIST for the Atwood-Gibson Writers' Trust Fiction Prize FINALIST Margaret and John Savage First Book Award, Fiction FINALIST Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award FINALIST OLA Forest of Reading Evergreen Award A four-year-old girl goes missing from the blueberry fields of Maine, sparking a tragic mystery that remains unsolved for nearly fifty years  July 1962. A Mi’kmaq family from Nova Scotia arrives in Maine to pick blueberries for the summer. Weeks later, four-year-old Ruthie, the family’s youngest child, is seen sitting on her favourite rock at the edge of a field before mysteriously vanishing. Her six-year-old brother, Joe, who was the last person to see Ruthie, is devastated by his sister’s disappearance, and her loss ripples through his life for years to come. In Maine, a young girl named Norma grows up as an only child in an affluent family. Her father is emotionally distant, while her mother is overprotective of Norma, who is often troubled by recurring dreams and visions that seem to be too real to be her imagination. As she grows older, Norma senses there is something her parents aren’t telling her. Unwilling to abandon her intuition, she pursues her family’s secret for decades. A stunning debut novel, The Berry Pickers is a riveting story about the search for truth, the shadow of trauma, and the persistence of love across time. Looking for a great gift for the book club member in your life? Consider The Berry Pickers, a top-rated novel that explores the secrets and tragedies of a Mi'kmaq family who travels to Maine to pick blueberries in the summer of 1962. With its realistic portrayal of family dynamics and Native American culture, this book is sure to spark engaging discussions and reflections. HarperCollins 2024
Subjects: Audiobooks.; Literary; Native American & Aboriginal; Family Life;
© 2023., HarperCollins,

When we were alone / by Robertson, David,1977-; Flett, Julie.;
When a young girl helps tend to her grandmother's garden, she begins to notice things that make her curious. Why does her grandmother have long, braided hair and beautifully colored clothing? Why does she speak another language and spend so much time with her family? As she asks her grandmother about these things, she is told about life in a residential school a long time ago, where all of these things were taken away. When We Were Alone is a story about a difficult time in history, and, ultimately, one of empowerment and strength.LSC
Subjects: Grandmothers; Native peoples; Indigenous peoples; Residential schools;