A review by panxa
The Long Exile: A Tale of Inuit Betrayal and Survival in the High Arctic by Melanie McGrath

4.0

This is an excellent book about a terrible topic. McGrath takes the first half of the book to set the scene in Inukjuak in the early 20th century, how the Inuit traditionally lived and how they had adapted to the incursion of the whites. The second section deals with the forced relocation of Inujuak families to the inhospitable and nearly uninhabitable Ellesmere Island in the 1950s, the lies told to the Inuit by the RCMP and the Arctic government, the near starvation conditions they lived in, and the eventual human rights hearing they received in the 1990s. The descriptions of how they were forced to live on Ellesmere Island were terrifying, but McGrath clearly held back, allowing the chapter about the hearing to express the full horror of the abuses. Also throughout the book were moments of terrible irony, such as when Nanook of the North was playing to packed houses and the star was starving to death in a blizzard, or when there was a European exhibit of Inuit art and the most esteemed carver was starving to death on Ellesmere.
This book was beautifully, and the sections on living in the Arctic were very informative, but it was too painful to call it a truly enjoyable read.