The Pale Indian

Steven Greenhalgh is the research librarian in the Department of Public
Health Sciences at the University of Alberta.

In 1972, John Daniel and his sister Eva, Blue Indians from Aberdeen in
the Northwest Territories, are removed from the care of their parents
and sent to live with a white couple residing just outside of Calgary.
As the children come to accept their new lives on the prairies, John
reveals a hidden talent for music.

At age 22, John takes a job with a drilling company that eventually
brings him back to his childhood home in the Northwest Territories. It
is here that he meets and falls in love with Tina Joseph, another
Native, who tells him the awful truth about his parents and how they
died. Enter Edward, the brother of John’s birth mother. For years,
Edward has been living in a mental institution in Edmonton, and it is
through him that shocking secrets soon come to light that will affect
John’s newfound happiness with Tina.

The Pale Indian is a powerful and brutally honest novel about secrets,
lies, and the fragility of happiness.