Small Ceremonies: A Novel

Part coming-of-age novel, part searing examination of a community finding itself, Small Ceremonies is a tantalizing and heartbreaking debut. “I fear for our friendship, for the day it will end, wondering when that day will be . . .” Tomahawk Shields (a.k.a. Tommy) and Clinton Whiteway are on the cusp of adulthood, imagining a future rife with possibility and greatness. The two friends play for their high school’s poor-performing hockey team, the Tigers, who learn at the start of the new season that the league wants them out. Their annual goal is now more important than ever: to win their first game in years and break the curse. As we follow these two Indigenous boys over the course of a year, we are given a panoptic view of Tommy and Clinton’s Winnipeg, where a university student with grand ambitions chooses to bottle her anger when confronted with numerous micro- (and not so micro-) aggressions; an ex-convict must choose between protecting or exploiting his younger brother as he’s dragged deeper into the city’s criminal underbelly; a lonely rink attendant is haunted by the memory of a past lover and contemplates rekindling this old flame; and an aspiring journalist does everything she can to uncover why the league is threatening to remove the Tigers. These are a sampling of the chorus of voices that depicts a community filled with individuals searching for purpose, leading them all to one fateful and tragic night. Ferociously piercing the heart of an Indigenous city, Kyle Edwards's sparkling debut is a heartbreaking yet humour-flecked portrayal of navigating identity and place, trauma and recovery, and growing up in a land that doesn't love you.

About the Author :
KYLE EDWARDS is an award-winning Anishinaabe journalist and writer from the Lake Manitoba First Nation and a member of the Ebb and Flow First Nation. A graduate of Ryerson University, he has worked as a journalist for Native News Online, ProPublica, and Maclean’s, and has been a Nieman Visiting Fellow at Harvard University and a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. He has won two National Magazine Awards in Canada for his reporting and was named Emerging Indigenous Journalist by the Canadian Association of Journalists. Kyle’s writing and reporting has appeared in BBC News World, Nieman Reports, BuzzFeed, CBC, Toronto Star, Global News, Sportsnet, Winnipeg Free Press, This Magazine, Advocate Magazine, U of T Magazine, and the Indigenous Peoples Atlas of Canada. He is a Provost Fellow at the University of Southern California, where he is pursuing a PhD in creative writing and literature.

Review :
FINALIST FOR THE GOVERNOR GENERAL'S LITERARY AWARD A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK: The Globe and Mail, Alta, The A.V. Club "An assured and poignant coming-of-age story. . . . [Edwards'] memorable novel grapples with both embracing and breaking free from a complicated heritage." —Booklist (starred review) "[A] spirited debut. . . . This will stay with readers." —Publishers Weekly “[As] the endearing characters are pulled in different directions with their conflicting ambitions and fears, Edwards’s gripping, humane writing tells a new tale of coming-of-age in an Indigenous community.”—Alta “In Small Ceremonies, award-winning journalist Kyle Edwards introduces readers to a group of Indigenous high school hockey players [and] weaves these individual narratives into a larger tapestry of identity and community.”—The A.V. Club “The geographical and familial landscape of the ironically named Whiteway clan yields a subtle and fascinating portrait of growing up Native in Manitoba. The understatement underscores the intensity and contradictions of outgrowing your home and self. This is a truly fine novel.” —Percival Everett, author of James “Small Ceremonies dropped my jaw with the glittering precision of its detail, and the life-affirming humanity of its characters. Kyle Edwards knows this world of frozen hockey rinks and fishing shacks just as intimately as he knows the warm and broken hearts of this Winnipeg community that he writes about. I haven’t been this excited about a debut in years.” —Michael Christie, author of Greenwood "Small Ceremonies flattens the grass for us all. A power play of wit, grit, and generational spirit, phenom Kyle Edwards has you rooting for the Tigers when few will. With its scars, scores, and hard-won triumphs, this polyphony of neechies carries us through overtime into glory. A dignified, accomplished, and suave figure-eight of a novel." —Cody Caetano, author of Half-Bads in White Regalia "Heartfelt, funny, and stirring, Small Ceremonies is an astonishing debut. Luminous enough to thaw a Manitoba hockey rink, this supple, sparkling novel follows an extended Indigenous family attempting to navigate Winnipeg's difficult urban terrain. Resurrecting hope from a world of inequity and disruption, Kyle Edwards fills these pages with soulful revelation. The result is a profound meditation on longing: for what was, what might've been, and what's still possible." —Adam Johnson, Pulitzer-Prize winning author of The Orphan Master's Son "In this compelling, multi-voiced first novel, Kyle Edwards carries us north to the landscape of Winnipeg, Manitoba, and into the geography of youth itself. This book—bracing, kaleidoscopic—made me relive those gritty, tender, fragile years before you are fully grown, when you still believe you can do both—stay rooted and fly free." —Danzy Senna, author of Caucasia and Colored Television "Such a chorus of compelling voices here! I would find myself growing attached to one character only to find the next equally engaging. Edwards is, at once, bracingly honest about and deeply tender towards everyone in this novel. A stunning debut." —Aimee Bender, author of The Butterfly Lampshade