A Grandmother Begins the Story

DEBUT Memoirist, poet, and scholar Porter’s (creative writing and Métis literature, Memorial Univ.; Scratching River) searingly captivating debut novel takes shape around five Métis women on seemingly divergent paths. Told beautifully in each of the women’s voices, as well as from the perspectives of bison, dogs, and the land they inhabit, each woman’s journey comes to intersect with another’s until the story is fully woven. Mamé is in the afterlife but remains tethered to this world until she can settle her ties to her girls left behind. Carter has just been asked by the grandmother she’s never met if she’ll go help kill her, and she thinks she’s agreed. Geneviève decides maybe it’s a good idea to get sober in what are likely her last months to live. Allie tries to hold on to everything so tightly she just might break it all, and she’s the reason Carter didn’t know she was Métis until she was a teenager and never met her Gramma.