sarahtownsend527 's review for:

Islands of Decolonial Love by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

5.0

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Leanne Simpson's collection of stories and poems in Islands of Decolonial Love are truly spectacular. It offers a powerful glimpse into Indigenous resurgence while retaining the beauty and effortlessness that seems to be to inherent in Simpson's storytelling. The reclamation of Indigenous voice and power is planted in even the smallest of nooks and crannies of the work, such as Simpson's refusal to use the Western standard of first word capitalization in sentences throughout the collection. For me, the fractured nature of the pieces within the collection spoke to a larger theme of piecing oneself, one's culture, and one's community back together after the heinous acts - and the still-present after effects - of colonialism. Simpson beautifully incorporates the sharing of love, knowledge and culture amongst community members despite age and gender.

This is truly a beautiful piece of both activism and art that I will surely return to in the future.