This illustrated guide includes concise descriptions of the First Nations of the three prairie provinces, providing an overview of the history and culture of many aboriginal groups in one handy volume.

The books begins with a brief history of the First Nations of the plains and subarctic. Each chapter deals with a different group, including the Assiniboine, the Blackfoo Confederacy (the Siksikah, Blood, Peigan, Sarcee, and Gros Ventre), the Plains and Woodland Cree, the Saulteaux, Dakota, Iroquois, Kootenay, Crow, Shoshoni, Chipewyan, Beaver, Slavey, and Sekani.

The origins, history, culture, language, customs, methods of hunting and preparing food, and religious practices of each group are detailed, as well as the effects on them of
European contact from the earliest times to the taking of treaty. The book also includes more than fifty archival photographs that depict some of the more prominent leaders, as well as ceremonies, clothing, social customs, and other aspects of daily life.

This book will be useful to students, teachers, researchers, and anyone interested in the history of Canada's aboriginal peoples.

Donald Ward sold his first story to CBC when he was nineteen-years-old and he has been writing professionally for the last forty years. His fiction is both thoughtful and humourous and always accessible no matter how fantastic his grounding premise may be. In 2004 his short fiction collection Nobody Goes to Earth Any More, won the Saskatchewan Book Award for Book of the Year, and his story “Badger” won the 2009 CBC Literary Award.

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