Becoming Little Shell: A Landless Indian's Journey Home

Winner of the Reading the West Book Award

Winner of the Pacific Northwest Book Award

A People Best Memoir of the Year

A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction of the Year Selection

A Book Riot Best Book of the Year

"I'm in awe of Chris La Tray's storytelling. Becoming Little Shell creates a multilayered narrative from threads of personal, family, community, tribal, and national histories."--Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass

Growing up in Montana, Chris La Tray always identified as Indian. Despite the fact that his father fiercely denied any connection, he found Indigenous people alluring, often recalling his grandmother's consistent mention of their Chippewa heritage.

When La Tray attended his grandfather's funeral as a young man, he finally found himself surrounded by relatives who obviously were Indigenous. "Who were they?" he wondered, and "Why was I never allowed to know them?" Combining diligent research and compelling conversations with authors, activists, elders, and historians, La Tray embarks on a journey into his family's past, discovering along the way a larger story of the complicated history of Indigenous communities--as well as the devastating effects of colonialism that continue to ripple through surviving generations. And as he comes to embrace his full identity, he eventually seeks enrollment with the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians, joining their 158-year-long struggle for federal recognition.

Both personal and historical, Becoming Little Shell is a testament to the power of storytelling, to family and legacy, and to finding home. Infused with candor, heart, wisdom, and an abiding love for a place and a people, Chris La Tray's remarkable journey is both revelatory and redemptive.

Author: Chris La Tray
Publisher: Milkweed Editions
Published: 08/20/2024
Pages: 320
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.30lbs
Size: 9.20h x 5.80w x 1.20d
ISBN: 9781571313980


Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 06/10/2024
Kirkus Reviews 06/15/2024
Booklist 08/01/2024 pg. 5
Shelf Awareness 08/22/2024
Foreword 08/14/2024

About the Author
Chris La Tray is a Métis storyteller, a descendent of the Pembina Band of the mighty Red River of the North, and an enrolled member of the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians, he is also the author of One-Sentence Journal: Short Poems and Essays from the World at Large, which won the 2018 Montana Book Award and a 2019 High Plains Book Award, as well as Descended from a Travel-Worn Satchel, a collection of haiku and haibun poetry. La Tray is the Montana Poet Laureate for 2023-2025 and a bookseller at Fact & Fiction. He writes the weekly newsletter "An Irritable Métis" and lives near Frenchtown, Montana.