A POC-only safe-space for Race & Class Discussion

Sandra Lamouche (illus. Azby Whitecalf), We Belong to the Drum (2023)

Children's picture book about a Plains Cree boy who, after spending his first summer attending the powwow circuit, goes to daycare for the first time and is inconsolable about it. Until his mother brings in a CD of powwow music! Which leads to an integration of his cultural identity into the daycare's activities, thus making daycare a safe and affirming place for him.

Based on the author's son's experiences. Includes a grammar note in the back about how to conjugate the character's names, which are in Cree in the text. The copy I read is in English, but the book is also available in Plains Cree.


Dierdre Havrelock (illus. Azby Whitecalf), Buffalo Wild! (2021)

Declan is wild about buffalo. After his Kokum tells him that the massive buffalo herds that once ranged the prairies now live in the sky, Declan calls them down, freeing them from behind their star gate, whereupon they go buffalo wild, rampaging through the neighborhood...

Published to honour the 2014 Buffalo Treaty, which has signatories from tribal nations across North America and as far away as Aotearoa.


Jesse Wente (illus. Shaikara David), Danger Eagle (2025)

The adventures of a stuffie stunt-penguin so daring and death-defying that "Danger" is his first name: DANGER EAGLE!

Great fun to do the voices for this one, and the illustrations were pretty great, too. Rated PA (Pretty Awesome).


Pamela Allen, Who Sank the Boat? (1982)

A group of domestic animal friends decide to go boating of a lovely summer day. Unfortunately, not a one of them knows a damn thing about boats. The animals survive, but Mr Peffer is gonna be so pissed when he sees what they've done to his lovely boat.


Rachel Poliquin (illus. Clayton Hanmer), The Museum of Odd Body Leftovers: A Tour of Your Useless Parts, Flaws, and Other Weird Bits (2022)

Picture book for older kids that serves as a nice little introduction to evolutionary theory, organized as a tour of vestigial organs and the quirks of ontogeny. Entertaining read and I learned a few things, such as the existence of the "disappearing kidney" (the mesonephros, a kidney structure still in lifelong use by our aquatic relatives, but which in reptiles, birds, and mammals is reabsorbed during fetal development, after our main kidneys come online).


Rachel Poliquin (illus. Clayton Hanmer), The Gland Factory: A Tour of Your Body's Goops, Juices, and Hormones (2025)

Sequel to the former, featuring highlights of the endocrine and exocrine systems. As entertaining and educational as the first, although this one was calibrated to be just that kind of disgusting that delights children of a certain age. (Especially in the first part of the book, I'd be reading along, "Interesting... I didn't know that... oh, cool... how fascinat— EWWWWWWW!"