Another one of the books I have been wanting to devote more time to is Gerald Friesen's enormous biography of the 19th century indigenous premier of Manitoba: The Honourable John Norquay, Indigenous Premier, Canadian Statesman, just appearing from University of Manitoba Press
It's a remarkable book: a political biography of a familiar-looking kind. Except the subject is indigenous, an English-speaking Metis raised in a mostly traditional life with indigenous grandparents all over his family tree -- and therefore a new and fresh kind of political biography.
Friesen seems to have mastered every possible source and every possible interpretation of John Norquay, and that makes it a long and detailed life story. I haven't even got to his premiership yet, but what I have read so far seems remarkable new and absolutely authoritative. This will be the basic book on early Manitoba for a very long time, I think
