What is wrong with THE REMARKABLE AND VERY TRUE STORY OF LUCY AND SNOWCAP; SORROW'S KNOT; GUARDIAN OF THE DEAD

A colleague asked me about H. M. Bouwman's The Remarkable and Very True Story of Lucy and Snowcap. Published in 2008 by Marshall Cavendish, it got a starred review from Kirkus, and was tagged as "serviceable" by School Library Journal. 

Right off the bat, I'm giving it a thumbs down.

The setting is 1787. One character, Lucy, is "Colay" which is a fictional Native tribe the author made up for this fantasy. Because it is fantasy, people will defend what Bouwman does with characterizations of that made-up tribe.

But because Americans know so little about Native peoples, I object to works of fantasy like The Remarkable and Very True Story of Lucy and Snowcap.  And Bow's Sorrow's Knot. And Healy's Guardian of the Dead. 

One of our most esteemed Native writers, Simon J. Ortiz, wrote some time back that people love to retell and read traditional Native stories. A great deal of those stories are "retold" by writers who are outsiders to the people whose story they are "retelling" according to their own needs and creativity. They profess being inspired by Native peoples.

Ortiz quite rightly points out that Native people have very real lives and very real issues that need attention. It might make writers feel good to "retell" our stories, or to use our stories to create fantasies like Bouwman and Bow and Healy have done, but in so doing, they're doing further harm to Native peoples.

Bouwman, Bow, and Healy (and they aren't the only ones!) are feeding a monster of stereotypical expectations of who we are. That is not ok. How can they--on one hand, profess admiration for us--and on the other hand, take/use/misappropriate Native stories and culture when what they do hurts Native people?

First Nations Fantasy by Daniel Heath Justice

Within Native Studies, there are a lot of awesome people. Daniel Heath Justice is among them. He teaches in the Centre for Aboriginal Initiatives at the University of Toronto. Daniel is Cherokee.

Academic work aside, Daniel writes fantasy. Specifically, a trilogy called "The Way of Thorn and Thunder." In it are three books: Kynship, Wynwood, and Dreyd.

You can read an interview with Daniel here.

I bought the books, but have not yet read them. Daniel calls the trilogy "an Indigenous Epic Fantasy." On this page, he talks about the "civilization" vs "savagery" binary, the Noble and Ignoble Savage imagery that predominates representations of indigenous peoples, and then, he talks about his series.

If you've read them, I'd love to hear your thoughts! If you're a fan of fantasy, order the books. They're published by (and available from) Kegedonce Press.