By Derek Cornet

La Ronge authors nominated for Saskatchewan Book Award

Feb 22, 2018 | 11:00 AM

Two La Ronge authors have been shortlisted for a Saskatchewan Book Award in children’s literature.

It was announced earlier this month that Miriam Körner and Bernice Johnson-Laxdal’s book When the Trees Crackle with Cold would be up for the award, which honours excellence in writing and publishing.

“The writing was a collaborative process,” Körner said. “Bernice would do the storytelling and I would type it into my computer. I would bring it back to her, and we would play it back and forth until the words were really singing.”

The two writers met each other years ago when they were both working at Pre-Cam Community School. They would tell each other stories, Körner said, and she became intrigued with Johnson-Laxdal’s classroom lessons about the different Cree words used for the moon of each month. Körner approached Johnson-Laxdal about the possibility of the writing an educational children’s book about it, and she agreed.

Written in the ‘Y’ Cree dialect, Körner noted the book also includes the English translation for the moon of each month, as well as a short story describing the activities Johnson-Laxdal would do with her family in Île-à-la-Crosse. The book also has illustrations by Körner, so children can see how those traditions looked. The two women have plans to translate the book into the “th” dialect, which is the local dialect of the Woodland Cree.

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“It is being used in the classrooms,” Körner said. “Bernice and I did a book tour, and we went into the classrooms and Bernice did storytelling too every month. We’re also working on an audio version…. teachers can click on the Cree words and it’s going to be read back to them by a Cree elder.”

The 25th Saskatchewan Book Awards is scheduled for April 28 in Regina. The book has already won a gold medal at the 2017 International Moonbeam Children’s Book Awards in the Multi-Cultural and non-fiction category.

derek.cornet@jpbg.ca

Twiiter: @saskjourno