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Reconciling: A Lifelong Struggle to Belong
A personal and historical story of identity, place, and belonging from a Musqueam-Chinese Elder caught between cultures
It’s taken most of Larry Grant’s long life for his extraordinary heritage to be appreciated. He was born in a hop field outside Vancouver in 1936, the son of a Musqueam cultural leader and an immigrant from a village in Guangdong, China. In 1940, when the Indian agent discovered that their mother had married a non-status man, Larry and his two siblings were stripped of their status, suddenly labeled “bastard children.” With one stroke of the pen, they were no longer recognized as Indigenous.
In Reconciling, Larry tells the story of his life, including his thoughts on reconciliation and the path forward for First Nations and Canada. His life echoes the barely known story of Vancouver — and most cities in the Americas, from Cusco to Mexico City, from New York to Toronto. It combines Indigenous traditions with key events of the last two centuries, including Chinese immigration and the Head Tax, the ravages of residential schools, and now Indigenous revival and the accompanying change in worldview. Each chapter takes the form of a series of conversations between Larry and writer Scott Steedman and is built around one pivotal geographical place and its themes, including the Musqueam reserve, Chinatown, the site of the Mission Residential School, the Vancouver docks, and the University of British Columbia.
When Larry talks about reconciliation, he uses the verb reconciling, an ongoing, unfinished process we’re all going through, Indigenous and settler, immigrant and Canadian-born. “I have been reconciling my whole life, with my inner self,” he explains. “To not belong was forced upon me by the colonial society that surrounded me. But reconciling with myself is part of all that.”
It’s taken most of Larry Grant’s long life for his extraordinary heritage to be appreciated. He was born in a hop field outside Vancouver in 1936, the son of a Musqueam cultural leader and an immigrant from a village in Guangdong, China. In 1940, when the Indian agent discovered that their mother had married a non-status man, Larry and his two siblings were stripped of their status, suddenly labeled “bastard children.” With one stroke of the pen, they were no longer recognized as Indigenous.
In Reconciling, Larry tells the story of his life, including his thoughts on reconciliation and the path forward for First Nations and Canada. His life echoes the barely known story of Vancouver — and most cities in the Americas, from Cusco to Mexico City, from New York to Toronto. It combines Indigenous traditions with key events of the last two centuries, including Chinese immigration and the Head Tax, the ravages of residential schools, and now Indigenous revival and the accompanying change in worldview. Each chapter takes the form of a series of conversations between Larry and writer Scott Steedman and is built around one pivotal geographical place and its themes, including the Musqueam reserve, Chinatown, the site of the Mission Residential School, the Vancouver docks, and the University of British Columbia.
When Larry talks about reconciliation, he uses the verb reconciling, an ongoing, unfinished process we’re all going through, Indigenous and settler, immigrant and Canadian-born. “I have been reconciling my whole life, with my inner self,” he explains. “To not belong was forced upon me by the colonial society that surrounded me. But reconciling with myself is part of all that.”
- GenresIndigenousNonfiction
232 pages, Paperback
Published September 9, 2025
8 people are currently reading
77 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
August 20, 2025
This book was completely different from what I expected … and I loved it!
It was as if I was having coffee and a walk through my city with my grandpa, learning about Vancouver’s early days and what he experienced in his youth as he sipped, walked, and talked. The format was a welcome treat.
I had never heard of Larry Grant before picking up this book. I learned that this 88-year-old lives locally and is an Elder of both the Vancouver Chinese community and the Musqueam Indian Band. The focus of this book is on the 34-year legal battle Larry and his siblings have undertaken in order to be recognized as status members of the Musqueam Nation. I appreciated the effort Larry went to in painting his background for readers so that we’d understand the challenges he faced and why reconciliation is important to him.
Larry’s Indian status was taken from him, his siblings and his mother because she married a Chinese immigrant. Under the Indian Act, status is patriarchal. I was absorbed in a great narrative, learning about why Aggasiz became the corn capital of B.C., that there was a residential school a mile down the road from me, the issues with renaming Trutch Street, the misuse of the term ‘ceded’ in conjunction with events I attend on Native land, the meaning of ‘musqueam’, the ‘Red Ticket Woman’ and the loophole in the Indian Act.
I highly recommend this memoir. Locals will appreciate a wander through Vancouver’s former days. I’m encouraged now to head out to my local university and see the places mentioned with regards to the reconciliation.
I was gifted this copy and was under no obligation to provide a review.
It was as if I was having coffee and a walk through my city with my grandpa, learning about Vancouver’s early days and what he experienced in his youth as he sipped, walked, and talked. The format was a welcome treat.
I had never heard of Larry Grant before picking up this book. I learned that this 88-year-old lives locally and is an Elder of both the Vancouver Chinese community and the Musqueam Indian Band. The focus of this book is on the 34-year legal battle Larry and his siblings have undertaken in order to be recognized as status members of the Musqueam Nation. I appreciated the effort Larry went to in painting his background for readers so that we’d understand the challenges he faced and why reconciliation is important to him.
Larry’s Indian status was taken from him, his siblings and his mother because she married a Chinese immigrant. Under the Indian Act, status is patriarchal. I was absorbed in a great narrative, learning about why Aggasiz became the corn capital of B.C., that there was a residential school a mile down the road from me, the issues with renaming Trutch Street, the misuse of the term ‘ceded’ in conjunction with events I attend on Native land, the meaning of ‘musqueam’, the ‘Red Ticket Woman’ and the loophole in the Indian Act.
I highly recommend this memoir. Locals will appreciate a wander through Vancouver’s former days. I’m encouraged now to head out to my local university and see the places mentioned with regards to the reconciliation.
I was gifted this copy and was under no obligation to provide a review.
September 9, 2025
This memoir is a fascinating read.
Indigenous storytellers are sorely needed in our society and those that tell true stories are the most desired.
Larry Grant's RECONCILING contains a wealth of knowledge about the indigenous history including the impact of the residential school genocide.
Anyone interested in the history of Vancouver will definitely want to pick up this book.
4 out of 5 Stars
Indigenous storytellers are sorely needed in our society and those that tell true stories are the most desired.
Larry Grant's RECONCILING contains a wealth of knowledge about the indigenous history including the impact of the residential school genocide.
Anyone interested in the history of Vancouver will definitely want to pick up this book.
4 out of 5 Stars
October 7, 2025
I’m writing this review on September 30, Truth and Reconciliation Day here in Canada, a date that recognizes the harms that have been enacted against Indigenous people, and our need to move forward together as a country from this. I’m lucky enough to have the day off work as well, so I’m taking advantage of my quiet(ish) day to review the last book of my month of Indigenous reading, which is Reconciling by Larry Grant in conversation with Scott Steedman. Written as a long meandering story of Grant’s life as told to his friend Scott it reads more like a memoir, and because Grant is given the space and time to revisit his entire 89 years, the wisdom passed on is considerable.
Book Summary
Larry Grant was born in a farmer’s field outside of Vancouver to an Indigenous mother, and a Chinese father. When the local Indian agent discovered that Larry’s mother was married to a non-Indigenous man, she lost her Indigenous status, and Larry and his two brothers were forced off the reserve. They spent their childhood years living in the growing Chinatown of Vancouver which still stands today, but gentrified since then. Even though they weren’t considered Indigenous in the eyes of the law at that time, he still recalls spending much time with family and friends on the Musqueam First Nation, learning his people’s traditional ways of fishing, while also enjoying the vegetables grown in nearby fields by his father and other Chinese immigrants. Although denied his Indigenous heritage as a child, this also protected him from attending the local residential school, which we know was an abusive system where many children died of neglect, disease, and starvation. With an incredible talent for mechanical work, Grant spent most of his working years on the Vancouver docks. He retired, but found a new calling as a teacher, now serving as the Elder-in-Residence at the Justice House of BC and the University of British Columbia’s First Nations House of Learning, helping youths learn to speak Musqueam, as very few living people speak it anymore. There’s a small section of black and white photographs from his life included in the book as well, some photos dating back as early as the 1920s and 1930s.
My Thoughts
Grant’s experience in many ways, was a lucky one. The fact that he was spared the trauma of residential school is no doubt a major reason why he continues to live such a healthy, happy life at his age. His life was by no means easy, but he relates these challenges to Steedman and the reader with a matter-of-factness that suggests his understanding that it could have been much worse, and was, for many of his peers who attended the residential school. Still, he is not accepting of the continuing unfairness that plagued his reserve for most of his life, which pushes him to demonstrate and protest regularly, but also drives him to continue working with youths to preserve the Musquem language, even though he isn’t fluent in it either (no one really is anymore). The slivers of humour and ‘get on with it’ attitude of Larry’s stories are what make this book such a pleasure to read – although the topics are of a serious nature, he’s ultimately just telling the story of his life; the good and the bad. His contentment with his own life is contagious, but he still manages to send the message that we must do more for future generations, that’s our duty as humans first and foremost.
One of my favourite parts of Grant’s book is the chapter in which he visits his Father’s rural village in China with his siblings. They are all elderly at this point, but they had never travelled to see where there father grew up, so together they decided to make the trip, and were surprised to see how modern it was. Their Dad’s childhood was never spoken about, and he moved to Canada when he was a very young man to build a new life, so this place was largely unknown to them. A documentary titled “All Our Father’s Relations” was created about their story, which Canadians can watch for free on the CBC (although not sure about my international readers!).
Grant explains his ‘why’ when telling his story, in the same matter of fact and clear-eyed reasoning the book is written in:
“Larry is writing this book in the hope that all our families and communities come to understand the hardships that many Canadians, especially Indigenous people, still live with today. ‘Hopefully it will get into the school system, so children that have been indoctrinated into white society privilege get to hear about their school mates of colour,’ he says. ‘Children of colour experience racism from birth, so non-people of colour should be able to accept and read about it. Children are very good at understanding fairness and equality'”(p. 83 of Reconciling by Larry Grant and Scott Steedman).
I felt it important to include the quote above because it’s a succinct reason for embarking on this project, but the rest of his story does not read like this – Grant does not shame the reader, or force any opinions on us. Instead, this story is simply his, and he hopes that it will open people’s minds to the told ( or still untold) struggles of those around us.
To read the rest of my reviews, please visit my blog:
https://ivereadthis.com/
Book Summary
Larry Grant was born in a farmer’s field outside of Vancouver to an Indigenous mother, and a Chinese father. When the local Indian agent discovered that Larry’s mother was married to a non-Indigenous man, she lost her Indigenous status, and Larry and his two brothers were forced off the reserve. They spent their childhood years living in the growing Chinatown of Vancouver which still stands today, but gentrified since then. Even though they weren’t considered Indigenous in the eyes of the law at that time, he still recalls spending much time with family and friends on the Musqueam First Nation, learning his people’s traditional ways of fishing, while also enjoying the vegetables grown in nearby fields by his father and other Chinese immigrants. Although denied his Indigenous heritage as a child, this also protected him from attending the local residential school, which we know was an abusive system where many children died of neglect, disease, and starvation. With an incredible talent for mechanical work, Grant spent most of his working years on the Vancouver docks. He retired, but found a new calling as a teacher, now serving as the Elder-in-Residence at the Justice House of BC and the University of British Columbia’s First Nations House of Learning, helping youths learn to speak Musqueam, as very few living people speak it anymore. There’s a small section of black and white photographs from his life included in the book as well, some photos dating back as early as the 1920s and 1930s.
My Thoughts
Grant’s experience in many ways, was a lucky one. The fact that he was spared the trauma of residential school is no doubt a major reason why he continues to live such a healthy, happy life at his age. His life was by no means easy, but he relates these challenges to Steedman and the reader with a matter-of-factness that suggests his understanding that it could have been much worse, and was, for many of his peers who attended the residential school. Still, he is not accepting of the continuing unfairness that plagued his reserve for most of his life, which pushes him to demonstrate and protest regularly, but also drives him to continue working with youths to preserve the Musquem language, even though he isn’t fluent in it either (no one really is anymore). The slivers of humour and ‘get on with it’ attitude of Larry’s stories are what make this book such a pleasure to read – although the topics are of a serious nature, he’s ultimately just telling the story of his life; the good and the bad. His contentment with his own life is contagious, but he still manages to send the message that we must do more for future generations, that’s our duty as humans first and foremost.
One of my favourite parts of Grant’s book is the chapter in which he visits his Father’s rural village in China with his siblings. They are all elderly at this point, but they had never travelled to see where there father grew up, so together they decided to make the trip, and were surprised to see how modern it was. Their Dad’s childhood was never spoken about, and he moved to Canada when he was a very young man to build a new life, so this place was largely unknown to them. A documentary titled “All Our Father’s Relations” was created about their story, which Canadians can watch for free on the CBC (although not sure about my international readers!).
Grant explains his ‘why’ when telling his story, in the same matter of fact and clear-eyed reasoning the book is written in:
“Larry is writing this book in the hope that all our families and communities come to understand the hardships that many Canadians, especially Indigenous people, still live with today. ‘Hopefully it will get into the school system, so children that have been indoctrinated into white society privilege get to hear about their school mates of colour,’ he says. ‘Children of colour experience racism from birth, so non-people of colour should be able to accept and read about it. Children are very good at understanding fairness and equality'”(p. 83 of Reconciling by Larry Grant and Scott Steedman).
I felt it important to include the quote above because it’s a succinct reason for embarking on this project, but the rest of his story does not read like this – Grant does not shame the reader, or force any opinions on us. Instead, this story is simply his, and he hopes that it will open people’s minds to the told ( or still untold) struggles of those around us.
To read the rest of my reviews, please visit my blog:
https://ivereadthis.com/
November 11, 2025
3.75. The author’s unique identity and history (Chinese, Musqueam, Irish, non-status Indian with a strong connection to the reservation) make for a fascinating and interwoven history of Vancouver, BC, and Canada as a whole. I really appreciated the parallels that this perspective presents and how these communities came together. As a Musqueam Elder, Mr. Grant continues to be very involved with the community, and it was cool to hear about the on-going efforts to protect their traditional language from dying off, while he's also in the process of re-learning the language himself. The photos were a sweet addition!
I think that the narration style (as a conversation between the authors) presents a big challenge when certain topics are lightly referenced or explored, when they deserve a lot more space and development. In part, this can be interesting to generate conversations among readers, but in many instances, I was left me with a lot of unanswered questions that I don't feel I can answer. For example, the book ends with a brief discussion of Musqueam land and property development in their recovered land, as well as a brief mention of Mr. Grant's grandfather's role in logging the area. The author recognizes some of the challenges (no one in the local Indigenous community can afford the developments, they won't see the ROI for decades, the development is by a beach that used to be a burial site for their ancestors). However, there's little discussion of how the community balances these challenges and more (what are the tensions with having to be a part of the system that oppresses you and is against your community's values? how could these developments be rooted in Indigenous practices, values, or knowledge? how do other communities [i.e. Global South] handle not being allowed to develop the way the rich have [i.e. clear cutting, dirty fuels, etc.]? what's the path forward?). I hoped for more of an exploration and discussion of how to square ideas like that.
I think that the narration style (as a conversation between the authors) presents a big challenge when certain topics are lightly referenced or explored, when they deserve a lot more space and development. In part, this can be interesting to generate conversations among readers, but in many instances, I was left me with a lot of unanswered questions that I don't feel I can answer. For example, the book ends with a brief discussion of Musqueam land and property development in their recovered land, as well as a brief mention of Mr. Grant's grandfather's role in logging the area. The author recognizes some of the challenges (no one in the local Indigenous community can afford the developments, they won't see the ROI for decades, the development is by a beach that used to be a burial site for their ancestors). However, there's little discussion of how the community balances these challenges and more (what are the tensions with having to be a part of the system that oppresses you and is against your community's values? how could these developments be rooted in Indigenous practices, values, or knowledge? how do other communities [i.e. Global South] handle not being allowed to develop the way the rich have [i.e. clear cutting, dirty fuels, etc.]? what's the path forward?). I hoped for more of an exploration and discussion of how to square ideas like that.
August 7, 2025
Thank you Simon and Schuster and Edelweiss for the advance copy of this book.
This is a tough one to review. The concept, ideas and story is solid. However, the delivery was average.
The story of an Indigenous boy with a father from another culture is fairly common. Most can agree that how we dealt with difference was not ideal. A country that needed to pinpoint “what and who” was not equipped to make good decisions when the scenario was a “grey” area.
Despite all of this, the narrative became boring at some points. He got bogged down in minute details and inconsequential parts of his life.
Overall, I like his story though.
This is a tough one to review. The concept, ideas and story is solid. However, the delivery was average.
The story of an Indigenous boy with a father from another culture is fairly common. Most can agree that how we dealt with difference was not ideal. A country that needed to pinpoint “what and who” was not equipped to make good decisions when the scenario was a “grey” area.
Despite all of this, the narrative became boring at some points. He got bogged down in minute details and inconsequential parts of his life.
Overall, I like his story though.
December 28, 2025
very very very good. really enjoyed the context given about the changing landscape of Vancouver, especially anecdotes about Chinatown... really puts into perspective just how quickly it has changed, become gentrified, and the community eroded
July 12, 2025
This is a nice reporting of a life lived, important for the historical record of the Musqueam.
Thanks to the publisher and Edelweiss for granting me access to an early digital review copy.
Thanks to the publisher and Edelweiss for granting me access to an early digital review copy.
October 11, 2025
Compelling historical narrative/interviews and personal perspectives.
September 9, 2025
Really appreciated hearing and amplifying lives like Larry’s, but the writing style became very monotonous after a while
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews