Return of the Canoe Societies

About the Book

Return Of The Canoe Societies tells the story of a group of  First Nations paddlers who are on a replication of the Qatuwas voyage by the Canoe Societies in 1993, to demonstrate solidarity for the many remaining land claims under negotiation by the B. C. Treaty Commission.  As they attempt to paddle to Bella Bella up the rugged coast of B. C., the paddlers come under physical attack by unknown opponent(s) of the Treaty settlements.

First, death threats against the paddlers are received by the Voyage of Solidarity Commitee.  Then the Dugout Coordinator, a Heiltsuk man named Nate Archer, mysteriously disappears after being pulled from the water following a overturning of the canoe.  He vanishes in a mysterious fishboat that picks him up as he tries to swim to shore to get help for the others.  Next, the owner of an old white and grey fishboat attempts to plough through the dugouts as they go in to a stopover point in Chemainus.  Nate Archers body is dumped from the fishboat as it leaves. He has been shot in the head.

The canoeists change their route to try and evade further attacks but are challenged by further ambushes as they struggle up the B.C. coast.

Relevent history is related in the novel by a series of time-travel flashbacks that take the main characters, Rachel McBay, a Heiltsuk young woman who is a graduate Psychology student, her grandmother, Rachel McBay, the Heiltsuk ceremonial chanter, Paul Archer, an activist lawyer, who has replaced Nate Archer, and Nigel Kent, the eccentric English, film documentor hired to record the voyage, on a tour of First Nations history since the arrival of the first English settlers to B. C.  They participate in the Potlatch on Village Island in 1921, the sentencing of the forty-five Kwakiutl people to prison in 1922, and their experiences there.  Other historical flasbacks include a visit to the residential school system, the Nishgaa chiefs being rebuffed by Premier Smithe in 1887, the McKenna-McBride Royal Commission on Indian Affairs, Deputy Superintendent Duncan Scotts plans for Assimilation, the Nishgaa land claim strategy in 1954, and scenes of the resurgence of the culture in Alert Bay in 1965 and the logging blockage on Meares Island.

About the Author

Rosemary I. Patterson, Ph.D. is a retired School Psychologist whose interests include Identity Achievement (who am I and what am I going to do with my life) in Adolescence. After a visit to Hawaii in 1988 she hypothesized that the Identity Achievement task would be more complicated in a multi-cultural population. The result has been five novels dealing with Identity Achievement in Hawaii. The other four novels include “An End To Innocence,” set in Hilo, “Aloha And MaiTais,” about Honolulu entertainers in the 1930's, “Kuhina Nui,” about King Kamehameha’s favorite wife, and “Kula Keiki Ali’i,” about the Chief’s Children’s School that in 1840 educated the children who would become monarchs of Hawaii.