Leanne Betasamosake Simpson books

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Non-Fiction

Standalone Novels

The Debwe Reading Order

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson is a member of Alderville First Nation and one of the most prominent Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg voices in contemporary Indigenous literature. She holds a PhD from the University of Manitoba and has spent decades working as a researcher, educator, and organizer alongside her writing career. Her first major publication, Lighting the Eighth Fire (2008), brought together Indigenous scholars and thinkers to address the protection and resurgence of Indigenous nations.

Simpson’s non-fiction books, including Dancing on Our Turtle’s Back (2011) and As We Have Always Done (2017), draw on Nishnaabeg intellectual traditions to challenge settler colonial frameworks. Her fiction and poetry take a different approach to the same concerns. Islands of Decolonial Love (2013) collects short stories about Indigenous life in urban and rural Canada, and her experimental novel Noopiming (2020) follows seven Nishnaabeg characters through a structure that resists conventional Western storytelling. She is also a musician and has released albums that accompany and extend her written work.