Sem's Map

From the author of I'm Finding My Talk comes a candid picture book about the importance of Indigenous place names, and acknowledging traditional lands.

Sem is confused. The map Mr. Trainer has just put on the screen is all wrong. It's the same shape as Turtle Island but it's nothing but boxes and lines, and it's filled with names he doesn't know. There's no reference to the stories of the land his Kiju tells him every night while she braids his hair. But Sem's teacher and classmates claim there's nothing wrong. It's the same map they've always used.

See tries to see the land the way Mr. Trainer showed him, but it just doesn't feel right. Where is the story of how the moose gets his dinner? Or where the fish run in the spring? Or when to tap the trees for syrup?

With the help of Kiju, Sem will show his teacher and his classmates how the stories of the land, the Indigenous place names, are far older than any map.

A gentle calling-in, this assured story from Governor General's Award finalist Rebecca Thomas is paired with colourful, lively illustrations from Azby Whitecalf, as well as colonial and decolonial maps of Turtle Island (North America) for reference. Sem's Map is an invaluable resource for caregivers, educators, and young readers about the importance of acknowledging the traditional lands we live on, and unlearning colonial ways of the past.

Rebecca Thomas (Lennox Island First Nation) is an award-winning Mi'kmaw poet. She is Halifax's former Poet Laureate (2016-2018) and has been published in multiple journals and magazines. She coordinated the Halifax Slam Poetry team from 2014 to 2017, leading them to three national competitions with the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word. Her first children's book, I'm Finding My Talk, was a Globe & Mail Top 100 Pick of 2019, as well as a CBC Best Picture Book of 2019, and was nominated for both the 2019 Ann Connor Brimer Award for Children's Literature and the 2019 Atlantic Publishers Marketing Association Best Atlantic-Published Book Award (with companion title I Lost My Talk). The book is a White Ravens 2020 selection, chosen by the International Youth Library in Munich, Germany, and has been nominated for First Nations Communities READ 2020. Thomas's first adult collection of poetry, I place you into the fire, was a CBC Best Canadian Poetry pick of 2020. Her book Swift Fox All Along was nominated for a Governor General's Award.

AZBY WHITECALF is a Plains Cree illustrator and character designer. Whitecalf previously illustrated Buffalo Wild! by Deidre Havrelock and We Belong to the Drum by Sandra Lamouche and is a graduate of AUArts, majoring in illustration with a bachelor’s degree in design. They have a fondness for fantasy stories, whimsical tales, and vibrant characters. They live in Saskatchewan.