It’s 8am in Nova Scotia when we talk, and Beaton’s eldest child is racing around in pyjamas, trying to escape her dad. “Potty-training: it’s a land of tears and devastation,” says Beaton, now 39, rolling her eyes. She wonders whether, if her father had needed to support his family by working on the oil sands, he would have found himself resocialized into one of the leering men who surround her, or whether he would have been one of the quiet ones who keeps his head down and says nothing. Given the right stimulus, it could probably have happened to almost anyone, she thinks. The book is about big, complicated issues: economic exploitation, misogyny, the abuse and disregard of Indigenous land and people, class, education, upward mobility, labor, environmental destruction, sexual harassment and assault, toxic industrial waste, power, history, complicity, identity, loss, sacrifice, family, home. The ground the book covers is far too broad and in-depth to go into in one review. But Beaton touches on these myriad complex subjects gently. Everything is told through conversations she had or overheard. It's never didactic or ponderous. She lets us make the connections ourselves. It's this representation that has made the book's success so meaningful. "When people from home enjoy the book — that makes me feel the most gratified." Alberta’s oil sands are the third-largest oil reserve in the world. The mines are large enough to be seen from space. They’re also considered some of the most environmentally destructive oil fields in the world, and Indigenous populations say the mines have been ruinous to their way of life.

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NINTH ANNUAL CHILDREN'S CHOICE BOOK AWARDS WINNERS ANNOUNCED DURING THE 97TH ANNUAL CHILDREN'S BOOK WEEK". The Children’s Book Council . Retrieved 25 April 2021.

a b Manning, Shaun (25 March 2009). "Kate Beaton Debuts w/ Darwin at MySpace DHP". CBR News. Comic Book Resources . Retrieved 28 March 2009.

Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands | Indigo Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands | Indigo

Not an excuse, no. But it shows that people are shaped by their environment and, in a less than stellar one, might act in ways they normally wouldn't. She didn't demonize all men because of her experience there but at the same time she showed how women suffer in toxic male environments - and are expected to just "deal with it" and not complain. a b c d "Doug Wright Awards: Past Winners". Archived from the original on 23 October 2020 . Retrieved 18 July 2021. The Princess and the Pony (New York, NY: Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic Inc., 2015, ISBN 978-0545637084) They will be hosted by Ali Hassan and will be broadcast on CBC Radio One, CBC TV, CBC Gem and on CBC Books. There is a lot of history to try to understand….(Indigenous rights, misogyny, environmental issues, capitalism, the complexity of real people)….

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Cut off from the rest of civilisation, oil sands workers are portrayed as an insular community, lonely, a misogynistic old boys' club, often depressed but unable to talk about mental health. Beaton creates a world apart from ours in which the loneliness drives many men to behaviours they wouldn't even consider in their "real lives". Harassment is considered normal; sexual assault all too common. The debates will take place live at 10:05 a.m. ET (that's an hour earlier than recent years). You can tune in live or catch a replay on the platform of your choice. You can see all the broadcast details here. One of the challenges was depicting boredom without becoming boring: she had to find a shape for the story that couldn’t be relationship-driven, because people were always moving on. “Boredom is one of the things that chips away at the mental health of people who live in the camps,” she says. “You go into work, and you do the same thing every day. You’re living in this tiny room. If you’re a woman, you can’t use the gym without all the men jammed in the doorway watching you.”