The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
A popular Canadian author hopes to raise some eyebrows with an upcoming book on the struggles facing the First Nation community of Pelican Narrows. Trouble at Pelican Narrows by award-winning Regina author Maggie Siggins is billed by its publisher as "an epic story of struggle and corruption." "By examining the past through the eyes of the people who live in Pelican Narrows, [Siggins] reveals a present crisis that has powerful implications for all Canadians," states a review on the web site of McClelland & Stewart publishers. Over some 200 years, the review states, outside society ? from missionaries to health care workers ? have "had a troubling effect" on the people of the reservation, located 120 kilometres northwest of Creighton. The book will detail contemporary life in the community by profiling Gordon Peter Ballantyne, a construction foreman, who lives in a typical reserve house with his wife and children. Siggins chose Ballantyne because of his unique perspective. He is the great-grandson of Peter Ballantyne, the first chief of the Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation, to which Pelican Narrows belongs. Siggins is the author of eight books including A Canadian Tragedy: The Story of JoAnn and Colin Thatcher, which won an Arthur Ellis Award for crime writing and Revenge of the Land, which won a Governor General's Award for Nonfiction. Trouble at Pelican Narrows is slated for release in March 2005 with a retail price of $37.99.
