Tag: Indigenous

Finding Serenity at Tea Creek Farm. A Documentary in Review

British Columbia is filled with lots of super and naturally charged places. One such place is Tea Creek, and to learn about its history and what it means to a nearby community is important.

Tea Creek Documentary PosterNow Playing on CBC Gem

Many Red Seal chefs are well aware of wanting to bring out the flavour of the land from the ingredients in the culinary meals they prepare. While not everyone at home thinks the same way, apparently the indigenous people who work at Tea Creek Farm (located near Kitwanga, BC) do, and they want to educate the world in more ways than one. There’s also how to grow as an individual.

One such person is Ryan Dickle, who no doubt worked here, and his desire to make a documentary, simply titled Tea Creek, is excellent at examining the life and times of Jacob Beaton. He transformed his family farm into a place of learning, to become a centre of community, and to reconnect with nature. This individual got serious with this endeavour about three years ago, and since then, lots of things have changed. Some are for the better, and others, just as worse. 

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Highwater Press. From Little by Little to The Rez Doctor, This Publisher is Paving A Bright Future for Everyone!

Sometimes, reading influential books and graphic novels is enough to show how young readers can change their lives for the better, and Highwater Press is leading the way!

Highwater Press LogoHighwater Press continues to impress readers with heroes who can make a difference in everyday life. Whether this concerns a young child in Little By Little to another who desires to dream big in The Rez Doctor, just what makes these stories special is that these role models come from indigenous roots.

I’m glad this publisher has given me the opportunity to read most of their late summer and autumn catalogue of works. They opened my eyes to what anyone can be capable of. While the focus is on what these writers with First Nations upbringing can imagine up, I really enjoyed their takes on life, how to change for the better, and be more humane to one another.

For example, the Reckoner Rises (review) series shows teens coming together and learning how to use their mutant (superhero) abilities to take on the establishment. Not every graphic novel released are as simple as that. They just tackle social issues everyone should be aware of. After the discovery of a mass grave in Kamloops, the theme of how to heal and do better for a rewarding future will always be a theme. That aspect is central to what the Surviving the City series (review) is about.

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In Little Moons, It’s Tough Not To Feel Down. Someone Must Rise Up Instead!

Now available in bookstores is Little Moons, and this graphic novel shows that life doesn’t have to be hard after when someone disappears, and everyone is fearing the worst.

Little Moons Graphic Novel Cover
Available to purchase on Amazon USA

Highwater Press‘ commitment to publish stories by emerging talents from the Indigenous community is to be commended. If I could offer a suggestion, they should have a larger presence at comic book conventions. That way, certain works like Little Moons, written by Jen Storm, can get the marketing it deserves.

This one-shot looks at a family dealing with loss. One day, Chelsea is the life of the party, and the next, she’s gone! Reanna hopes that Chelsea simply ran away, but everyone must accept the horrible truth–she fell victim to a random abduction. As a result, there’s a melancholy embedded in every page. When these tales concern isolated communities with brief communication with the authorities, they offer limited hope.

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When The Reckoner Rises, Just Who Are the Watchman?

God Flare is the latest volume in the Reckoner Rises series from best-selling author David A. Robertson.

The Reckoner Rises Book CoverHighwater Press

The Reckoner Rises is a graphic novel series that’s sure to turn heads. I would not advise jumping in with the latest volume, titled God Flare. I was curious because of the fantastic attention grabbing cover by Scott B. Henderson, but in order to understand what’s going on, I had to chase down the first two graphic novels. I got the feeling this work took inspiration from Alan Moore’s The Watchman, and overall, I’m not wrong!

When readers are first introduced to Cole, we find him on the verge of a breakdown and he doesn’t understand why he’s The Chosen One. He has the mutant ability which allows him to communicate with the dead, and for Eva, who has the powers of flight, they could easily become the next Alpha Flight! But when they’re living on a reserve, it seems they don’t have a lot of inspiration to go to the next level and do stuff for the good of their community. In the harsh winter world of what I assume is Northern Winnipeg, I’m sure the life there is no different from what I’ve learned in other works, like The Death Tour (documentary review link), which examines what life is like in these sleepy indigenous communities.

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Surviving The City Can Be Rough. In Volume 3: We Are the Medicine What’s Examined is Based on Real Life.

In this graphic novel series, Surviving the City, isn’t just about how one culture is dealing with colonialism, but rather with how many other lives can get affected at the same time.

Tasha Spillett, author of Surviving the CityHighWater Press
Spoiler Alert

Some knowledge of what the graphic novel series, Surviving the City, wants to educate is required to acknowledge what the latest instalment Volume 3: We Are Medicine, hopes to heal. Ever since the news about finding a mass grave of children near a former residential school in Kamloops broke out in 2021, there were a lot of protests and finger pointing. The world blamed people in prominent positions of power of the atrocity. Even now, the after-effects are still ongoing. Some reconciliation has happened since, but what’s presented here as fiction is coming true in the real world after reading “Chief says grave search at B.C. residential school brings things ‘full circle’” from the Kelowna Capital News.

This story by Tasha Spillett (pictured above left) makes up the backdrop where Miikwan and Dez are thinking about their futures. This author/educator/public speaker strives for a world where multiculturalism is embraced and everyone is treated with compassion. It’s basically what Gene Roddenberry envisioned for Star Trek, and everything Sisko would fight for when he travelled back in time and became part of the protests for equal rights in “Past Tense, Parts One and Two (Deep Space 9).”

In this story, these youths want to make the world a better place. They will soon graduate, and instead of figuring out what to wear for their last prom, these two indigenous teens change their plans and want to help after this news broke out. These are wonderful kids. Even Dez, the protagonist from the first two books, gets involved! After her own dealings with “The System,” how she deals with authoritarianism is important too. Continue reading “Surviving The City Can Be Rough. In Volume 3: We Are the Medicine What’s Examined is Based on Real Life.”

Aside from The Mammoth, What Else Could Be Hiding in the Pacific Northwest?

The Mammoth Comic Book Cover Issue 1Mad Cave Studios

Paul Tobin and Arjuna Susini are the writing/artist team behind The Mammoth, a comic book about some terror who has terrorised Broke Tree Valley since the 1800s. Just what lurks here may well be the same evil that permeates Aokigahara in Japan. Although the cover paints this world as located somewhere in North America, no forest is as legendary as that! As for how huge it is depends on whom you ask, and what readers interpret from the first few pages.

The first question I had concerns where this valley is located? Is it the Appalachian Mountains or somewhere closer to Massachusetts? This inquiring mind wants to know, as life in that small town makes up most of the narrative in the first issue. I was drawn to this title because of the imposing cover, and that the beast looks like a giant-sized mummy!

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