Approaching fire

***ippy awards: best regional non-fiction: canada-west – silver***

***indigenous voices awards 2021, published prose in english: creative non-fiction and life-writing: finalist***

***first nation communities read awards 2021/22: longlist***

***next generation indie book awards, regional (non-fiction): finalist***

***the miramichi reader's 2020 most promising author award***

***bmo winterset award 2020 longlist***

in approaching fire, michelle porter embarks on a quest to find her great-grandfather, the métis fiddler and performer léon robert goulet. through musicology, jigs and reels, poetry, photographs, and the ecology of fire, porter invests biography with the power of reflective ingenuity, creating a portrait which expands beyond documentation into a private realm where truth meets metaphor.

weaving through multiple genres and traditions, approaching fire fashions a textual documentary of rescue and insight, and a glowing contemplation of the ways in which loss can generate unbridled renewal.