The Lesser Blessed

PEOPLE MAGAZINE'S TOP 10 'ESSENTIAL FICTION, NONFICTION, MEMOIR AND SHORT STORIES BY NATIVE AMERICAN AND INDIGENOUS AUTHORS TO ADD TO YOUR LIST'

The 30th-anniversary edition of the coming-of-age Indigenous cult classic.

Richard Van Camp's internationally acclaimed, bestselling novel about coming of age in Canada's North has become an Indigenous classic and inspired a critically acclaimed film. This special 30th-anniversary edition features a new introduction from the author, as well as two bonus short stories that follow the lives of the novel's main characters.

The Lesser Blessed tracks the exploits of Larry Sole, a Dogrib teenager living in the small Northern town of Fort Simmer. After losing much of his memory in a violent accident, what he loves more than anything is reading, hearing and collecting stories. With no interest in booze or sports, he floats on the edges of high school life, sustained by his love of Iron Maiden and a hopeless passion for school hottie Juliet Hope. When good-looking, trouble-seeking Johnny Beck moves into town, he shakes up Larry's dreamy existence and leads him into a life of sex, drugs and violence, bringing him face to face with memories that he's done his best to lose.

Raw, funny, and unflinching, The Lesser Blessed is a powerful story of adolescence, friendship, desire and survival--and of a young Dogrib man confronting the past as he struggles to find his place in the world.