This Land

With a title that echoes a song long protested as erasing Indigenous history, this work—part of the Race to the Truth series—aptly communicates the issue of land acknowledgments. As the book opens, a child narrator notes how “this is my house.... Before us, another family lived here”—a concept that introduces “a whole village full of families, laughing, cooking, and playing,” whom European settlers would forcibly remove to reservations. A question the child asks during travels (“Who lived here before the people who live here now?”) leads to several spreads that acknowledge Indigenous homelands (“At the Golden Gate Bridge, I learned that the Ohlone have been fishing here for thousands of years”). Shape-based art by Anishinaabe illustrator George (Autumn Peltier, Water Warrior) foreground landscapes and portraiture in this work about how Indigenous people “have always been here, and they’re still here, wherever we go.” And Anishinaabe author Fairbanks, making a picture book debut, renders a memorable message: “This land is sacred./ This land is living./ From the Black Hills/ to Pueblo Canyon,// From the swampy bayous/ to the salmon swimming,/ this land all has a history.” More about land acknowledgment concludes. Ages 4–8. Author’s agents: Jess Regel, Helm Literary. Illustrator’s agent: Nicole Geiger, Full Circle Literary.(Aug.)