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Scratching River
Scratching River weaves multiple stories and voices across time to explore the strengths and challenges of the ways in which Métis have created, and continue to create, home through a storied and mobile social geography that is always on the move.
The book foregrounds the story of a search for a home for Michelle Porter’s older brother, who holds dual diagnoses of schizophrenia and autism, and the abuse he endured at the rural Alberta group home that was supposed to care for him. Interspersed throughout are news clippings about the investigation into “The Ranch,” the home in question. Métis history is woven between the contemporary stories of the author, her brother, and her mother. As the pieces come together, the book uses the river as a metaphor to suggest that rather than a weakness, the ability to move and move again and to move on has enabled survival, healing, and ongoing reconciliation.
The book foregrounds the story of a search for a home for Michelle Porter’s older brother, who holds dual diagnoses of schizophrenia and autism, and the abuse he endured at the rural Alberta group home that was supposed to care for him. Interspersed throughout are news clippings about the investigation into “The Ranch,” the home in question. Métis history is woven between the contemporary stories of the author, her brother, and her mother. As the pieces come together, the book uses the river as a metaphor to suggest that rather than a weakness, the ability to move and move again and to move on has enabled survival, healing, and ongoing reconciliation.
184 pages, Paperback
Published April 26, 2022
2 people are currently reading
189 people want to read
About the author
Michelle Porter
29 books117 followersMICHELLE PORTER is the descendent of a long line of Métis storytellers. Many of her ancestors told stories using music and today she tells stories using the written word. She holds degrees in Journalism, Folklore, English, and a PhD in Geography. Her academic research and creative work focus on home, memory, and women’s changing relationships with the land.
Her book A Grandmother Begins the Story: A Novel will be published November 7, 2023.
Her most recent book, Scratching River, a memoir exploring the meaning of her Métis heritage through her older brother’s life story, was published by Wilfrid Laurier Press in April 2022. She’s also published a book of creative nonfiction about her great-grandfather, a fiddler from the Red River, called Approaching Fire (shortlisted for the Indigenous Voices Award 2021) and a book of poetry, Inquiries, (shortlisted for the Pat Lowther Memorial Award). Michelle has won numerous awards for her poetry and journalism and her work has been published in literary journals and magazines across the country. Currently she is teaching creative writing and Métis Literature at Memorial University. She is a member of the Manitoba Métis Federation and she lives in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador.
Her book A Grandmother Begins the Story: A Novel will be published November 7, 2023.
Her most recent book, Scratching River, a memoir exploring the meaning of her Métis heritage through her older brother’s life story, was published by Wilfrid Laurier Press in April 2022. She’s also published a book of creative nonfiction about her great-grandfather, a fiddler from the Red River, called Approaching Fire (shortlisted for the Indigenous Voices Award 2021) and a book of poetry, Inquiries, (shortlisted for the Pat Lowther Memorial Award). Michelle has won numerous awards for her poetry and journalism and her work has been published in literary journals and magazines across the country. Currently she is teaching creative writing and Métis Literature at Memorial University. She is a member of the Manitoba Métis Federation and she lives in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador.
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
January 18, 2022
Scratching River is a name that considers the gratchias, the burdock that grows thick along the river’s banks. It’s this stout weed Louis spoke of all those years ago when his memories were recorded. It’s a plant you can’t forget really. Gratchias grows in wet and mud, and the banks of rivers offer the perfect conditions for the burdock to grow. Gratchias is a name for all those burrs that dig at the river’s quick hips, for the stout purple clusters that hook and irritate, born to be tenacious and prickly.
In a poetic and unconventional work of narrative nonfiction, Métis author Michelle Porter uses several different threads of story and style in Scratching River to braid together meaning from the history of her immediate family, her ancestors, and the entire Métis people. Primarily centered on Porter’s older brother Brendon — and the personal trauma that the author suffered when she, as a teenager, learned of the abuse Brendon was experiencing at a group home — Porter hearkens to the vanished landscape that her people so closely identified with to claim for them the tenacity of the gratchias, the adaptability of a rerouted river, and the strength of prairie bison. This is such a personal story, told in an engagingly provocative manner, that “rating” it feels meaningless: this is a perfect manifestation of its intent. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final forms. As a matter of fact: There were quirks in the digital copy — “ff”, “th”, “fi” were all dropped from words — and I took it upon myself to fix those errors in my quotes; and to be honest, I appreciated that I had to slow down my reading to mentally fix words along the way.)
My brother was drying up. He had become closed up and so cracked and so oozing we didn’t know if he would survive. If it can, a river will keep on moving, no matter what, but there are times when rivers stop flowing. Contributing to the stoppage are factors that include the meander of the river, the history of trauma written in the layers of rocks and sediment, the patterns of autism, schizophrenia, and poverty, and the way these braid themselves across the landscape, and the riverbank histories of the people he doesn’t know are his.
Brendon would eventually be diagnosed with schizophrenia and autism, but as an uncommunicative and uncontrollable (if mostly watchful and impish) child, his loving mother made the hard decision to place him in a residential institution for autistic children. Porter relates many trips by Greyhound bus to visit her brother from their home outside Edmonton to his in Calgary, and Brendon was always happy to see them; was obviously well cared for and safe. But when he turned eighteen, Brendon’s mother was forced to find an adult facility for him, and although “The Ranch” was presented as an excellent home, it was horrifying for her to discover, a few months later, that Brendon was in hospital with third degree burns to his lower legs and what looked like cigarette burns on his thighs and genitals. Unable to vocalise what happened to him, and the owner of The Ranch denying any responsibility, there seemed to be no interest by the police or government to seek justice for Brendon. This awful story is unspooled slowly, interspersed with transcripts from contemporaneous newspaper and television investigations into complaints about The Ranch, along with Porter’s happier memories, and excerpts from a book made out of the transcriptions of oral stories as related by Porter’s great-great-grandfather's brother — noted Métis storyteller and musician, Louis Goulet. Goulet’s stories relate the old ways of the Métis people — the buffalo hunts, long trading trips with oxen and Red River wagons, prairie fires that bring both danger and renewal — and against this historical perspective, Porter juxtaposes the modern Métis struggle for recognition, land, and treaty rights. And it all works together to weave a picture both personal to Porter’s family and common to the Métis people; a picture of tenacity, adaptability, and strength. In an Afterword, Porter explains her intent:
We continue and we thrive when we recover our ability to tell our stories from the land seven generations back, pointing them in the direction of the seven generations that are coming ahead of us all. We survive because we are always moving and we bring our stories
Porter also explains that she wrote Scratching River as a way of dealing with the trauma brought on by watching Brendon recover from his burns when she was fourteen, but she doesn’t dwell on these hard parts in the book. Instead, she writes that he was eventually placed in a very good home closer to family; choosing to dwell on happier memories:
My big brother taking me by the hand, pulling me into his world. One hand cupping one ear. Tapping a wall, a tree. A big smile. In a sing-song voice: da-da-da, and da-da-da again. Off I went with him.
Lush landscape writing, maps with handwritten notations, a bibliography that reads like poetry: There's just so much here, and it all works together perfectly.
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June 17, 2022This was a powerful book, vignettes and reflections on the author's brother, who was abused in a group home, and an ancestor who wrote of his childhood on the buffalo hunt, as well as on the changing environmental features--prairie grass, the river, the animals. Porter does an excellent job connecting these these themes from a personal perspective, in the process imbuing them with meaning for me as the reader.
My full review: https://atlanticbooks.ca/stories/chri...
My full review: https://atlanticbooks.ca/stories/chri...
May 12, 2022
This book proves that you don’t have to be big and loud to have an impact. So much to say about this but I’ll say little specific as it needs to be approached with fresh eyes and no pre-conceptions.
A deeply personal, deeply moving exploration tying together family, culture, history and environment in an effort to make sense of how the author came to be where she is now… of how her experiences as a 14 year old younger sister to her older brother Brendon have impacted - have shaped - both she and her family, and by extension, the community.
I was absolutely absorbed in her telling of her story while I was reading it, but I valued - appreciated - it even more upon reading her afterword -in which she answers some of the questions I had while reading - while explaining the choices she made with regards to both the treatment of materials - including decisions about inclusion or exclusion - and matters of presentation.
While slim - at only 150 pages - this is a book that demands the reader take their time. Read slowly. Pause frequently. Reflect on the text as you go. Appreciate the artistic choices she has made along the way.
And as a final act, make copies of the Bibliography, and pledge to read your way through any title among the many that you’ve not already read.
Thanks to the publisher and Edelweiss for granting me access to a digital ARC (even though I didn't get around to reading it before it expired off my device so had to wait for a hard copy anyway...)
A deeply personal, deeply moving exploration tying together family, culture, history and environment in an effort to make sense of how the author came to be where she is now… of how her experiences as a 14 year old younger sister to her older brother Brendon have impacted - have shaped - both she and her family, and by extension, the community.
I was absolutely absorbed in her telling of her story while I was reading it, but I valued - appreciated - it even more upon reading her afterword -in which she answers some of the questions I had while reading - while explaining the choices she made with regards to both the treatment of materials - including decisions about inclusion or exclusion - and matters of presentation.
While slim - at only 150 pages - this is a book that demands the reader take their time. Read slowly. Pause frequently. Reflect on the text as you go. Appreciate the artistic choices she has made along the way.
And as a final act, make copies of the Bibliography, and pledge to read your way through any title among the many that you’ve not already read.
Thanks to the publisher and Edelweiss for granting me access to a digital ARC (even though I didn't get around to reading it before it expired off my device so had to wait for a hard copy anyway...)
April 15, 2022
Michelle Porter weaves this complex recollection of personal trauma, cultural change, transition and travel, and ecological grief. The story of Brendan, a beautiful boy with a dual diagnosis, told through recollections, investigate and newspaper articles, is at the same time sad and heartwarming. The family’s love so strongly apparent against the ranch’s hostility. What happens to young people who lack natural advocates? Who speaks for them when they cannot? While unfolding Brendan’s story, Ms Porter intertwines Métis journey through history. To complete the braid all stories are interconnected with the land, rivers, distances, landmarks, animals. This was not an easy read for me. But it has the best bibliography I have ever seen.
Thank you ZG Stories for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.
Thank you ZG Stories for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.
April 30, 2024
New all time favourite! I love the way it was written, it hurt to read but was incredibly told. The bibliography was the most inspiring and important I’ve ever seen. There’s more I want to say but I’m still sitting in this for now.
June 9, 2025
This was quite difficult to read at times because of the content, but I really like the analogies of personalities and rivers and how she connected everything with climate change.
May 20, 2022
Enjoyed taking my time with this meandering novel. Thanks to ZG Stories for a copy!
This is a memoir but Porter’s slow-moving, reflective prose makes it feel almost poetic. There are 3 main parts she brings together here: the story of her Métis ancestor who experienced Canada’s initial colonial policies and decrease in bison herds firsthand; the story of her brother who was diagnosed with autism and schizophrenia and suffered abuses in a care home; and a story of the changing rivers of this land that both men and the author have travelled through.
While Porter’s own description of the abuses against her brother by those meant to protect him are not detailed, she does include transcripts and clips from news stories and documentaries that provide more graphic accounts. I especially loved the afterword that provided more context on the author’s motivation for telling this story and her choice in format.
This is a memoir but Porter’s slow-moving, reflective prose makes it feel almost poetic. There are 3 main parts she brings together here: the story of her Métis ancestor who experienced Canada’s initial colonial policies and decrease in bison herds firsthand; the story of her brother who was diagnosed with autism and schizophrenia and suffered abuses in a care home; and a story of the changing rivers of this land that both men and the author have travelled through.
While Porter’s own description of the abuses against her brother by those meant to protect him are not detailed, she does include transcripts and clips from news stories and documentaries that provide more graphic accounts. I especially loved the afterword that provided more context on the author’s motivation for telling this story and her choice in format.
April 15, 2022
A gorgeous braided memoir brimming with ecological metaphor. It explores a path toward healing from trauma through shared and fragmented recollections. Profoundly moving and poetic. Highly recommended.
March 30, 2022
Coming in at about 160 pages, Scratching River is a memoir as well as a place for ancestral writings and musings on nature that is central to the lives of Métis people.
The author’s older brother has been diagnosed with autism and schizophrenia and has spent his life in various group homes and institutions. After aging out of a childhood facility he attends a group home called The Ranch (the specific name of the Ranch has been vetted from the book). The author was 14 when her brother suffered some serious abuse at the hands of the people there to care for him. A series of articles in the local paper gave some details and the lack of government action is shown. The family spent time traveling to wherever Brendon was when the facility allowed it. Porter says in the Afterword that she wrote the book from the perspective of herself as a 14 year old and it is told in a traditional Métis way.
The book also follows other strains of Métis life.
One is that of her great great grandfather’s brother Louis Goulet, who travelled in the late 1800s by ox and cart to hunt bison and to sell goods. Through passages of Goulet’s writing, from his own book, we learn about the land and the bison and traditional farming/hunting methods. Porter then updates the information with information and dilemmas about hunting the reduced number of bison and treaty rights.
Lastly throughout the book is descriptions of different river formations and locations. I saw parallels to how trauma acts on people but I’m not sure if this was the true intention of the author. Climate change was also a focus on how rivers, grasslands, and drought will change.
Overall I found this book very interesting although also quite jarring in its constant changing of subject matter. I wonder if I missed connections that were intended or if the author, as she hints at in the afterword, intended this book to be about one thing and then it grew.
Thank you @zgstories and Wilfred Laurier University Press for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinions. Scratching River publishes April 26, 2022.
The author’s older brother has been diagnosed with autism and schizophrenia and has spent his life in various group homes and institutions. After aging out of a childhood facility he attends a group home called The Ranch (the specific name of the Ranch has been vetted from the book). The author was 14 when her brother suffered some serious abuse at the hands of the people there to care for him. A series of articles in the local paper gave some details and the lack of government action is shown. The family spent time traveling to wherever Brendon was when the facility allowed it. Porter says in the Afterword that she wrote the book from the perspective of herself as a 14 year old and it is told in a traditional Métis way.
The book also follows other strains of Métis life.
One is that of her great great grandfather’s brother Louis Goulet, who travelled in the late 1800s by ox and cart to hunt bison and to sell goods. Through passages of Goulet’s writing, from his own book, we learn about the land and the bison and traditional farming/hunting methods. Porter then updates the information with information and dilemmas about hunting the reduced number of bison and treaty rights.
Lastly throughout the book is descriptions of different river formations and locations. I saw parallels to how trauma acts on people but I’m not sure if this was the true intention of the author. Climate change was also a focus on how rivers, grasslands, and drought will change.
Overall I found this book very interesting although also quite jarring in its constant changing of subject matter. I wonder if I missed connections that were intended or if the author, as she hints at in the afterword, intended this book to be about one thing and then it grew.
Thank you @zgstories and Wilfred Laurier University Press for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinions. Scratching River publishes April 26, 2022.
October 16, 2025
This book was recommended to me by a friend, who themself had it recommended by someone else. With the recommendation came a caveat: in order to read it, you need to listen to the audiobook on Spotify Premium. Otherwise, you'll spend a lot of time trying to hunt down a copy for an affordable price and you'd probably have to get it imported. I'm a patient person, I don't mind waiting to find a physical copy, and I have no desire to give Spotify my money. I thanked my friend and added this book to my TBR list, with the intention of finding a physical copy in the future and reading it that way.
Well, as fate would have it, Spotify offered me a free month of listening to audiobooks, something that would have expired today (October 15th, 2025) had I not accepted. I thought of this book, and yesterday (the 14th,) I accepted the offer with the intention of using the trial and cancelling the sub after listening. Turns out, the audiobook for Scratching River is less than 4 hours long. I've listened to it when I can between yesterday and today.
This is not an easy book to go through. It details the abuse that the author's older brother endured in a ranch/living place for autistic adults. If this sort of topic and discussion is especially upsetting and difficult for you, I recommend going on the StoryGraph to view the user content warnings, or else looking at additional reviews of this book for further content warnings. Again, this isn't an easy read. But it IS an important one, and one I think is worth going through, even if you have to go through Spotify for it.
Well, as fate would have it, Spotify offered me a free month of listening to audiobooks, something that would have expired today (October 15th, 2025) had I not accepted. I thought of this book, and yesterday (the 14th,) I accepted the offer with the intention of using the trial and cancelling the sub after listening. Turns out, the audiobook for Scratching River is less than 4 hours long. I've listened to it when I can between yesterday and today.
This is not an easy book to go through. It details the abuse that the author's older brother endured in a ranch/living place for autistic adults. If this sort of topic and discussion is especially upsetting and difficult for you, I recommend going on the StoryGraph to view the user content warnings, or else looking at additional reviews of this book for further content warnings. Again, this isn't an easy read. But it IS an important one, and one I think is worth going through, even if you have to go through Spotify for it.
March 10, 2022
As soon as I read the description for this book, I knew I was going to love it. It’s a personal, emotional read that is so unique in its blend of blends lyrical prose with clippings from newspapers, histories, maps, and memories. In her life retellings, Michelle Porter depicts memory as flow, as imperfect, and true to the experiences of remembering. It’s not solid, but instead is cobbled together by elements of specific details and mixed feelings.
I loved how Métis histories are braided through this book to remind us of their continued reverberations through time, as Porter writes “rivers can split and weave to cope with barriers” and create interconnections to reflect new worlds as we see today. Using the metaphors and teachings of the river, combined with maps annotated with personal connections places the reader in the local context, which has a particular resonance of rooting us in these stories.
There is a particular power in memoirs and stories for personal healing, for others who see themselves in you and your story to know you’re not alone, and to show the cracks in a harsh world.
Thank you so much to ZG stories for providing me with a copy of this eARC in exchange for an honest review.
I loved how Métis histories are braided through this book to remind us of their continued reverberations through time, as Porter writes “rivers can split and weave to cope with barriers” and create interconnections to reflect new worlds as we see today. Using the metaphors and teachings of the river, combined with maps annotated with personal connections places the reader in the local context, which has a particular resonance of rooting us in these stories.
There is a particular power in memoirs and stories for personal healing, for others who see themselves in you and your story to know you’re not alone, and to show the cracks in a harsh world.
Thank you so much to ZG stories for providing me with a copy of this eARC in exchange for an honest review.
April 15, 2022
Scratching River was a challenging read, not only due to the difficult subject matter it tackles, but also the unique structure through it is presented. In the end, the format of storytelling made much more sense to me, but throughout it was a bit jarring to move so quickly between different topics. When I was getting very invested and wanted more, there was an abrupt cut to the other part of the story being told. I respect the author’s intent and I think it’s quite brilliant in retrospect, but it just made the reading experience more difficult personally.
Handling a story of abuse towards a person diagnosed with schizophrenia and autism witnessed first hand is difficult, it’s uncomfortable and it is important. What goes on in institutions that take care of people that can’t speak for themselves must be scrutinized and I think this work brings awareness to this issue extremely effectively.
I also thoroughly enjoyed the parts detailing the Métis people history, I learned so much and I am interested in researching more. As well as the matter of the impact colonization had in the ecosystems.
Thank you so much to NetGalley for providing me with a digital arc for this book!
Handling a story of abuse towards a person diagnosed with schizophrenia and autism witnessed first hand is difficult, it’s uncomfortable and it is important. What goes on in institutions that take care of people that can’t speak for themselves must be scrutinized and I think this work brings awareness to this issue extremely effectively.
I also thoroughly enjoyed the parts detailing the Métis people history, I learned so much and I am interested in researching more. As well as the matter of the impact colonization had in the ecosystems.
Thank you so much to NetGalley for providing me with a digital arc for this book!
October 1, 2023
In honour of National Truth and Reconciliation Day, this week I have been reading this memoir by Canadian Métis writer Michelle Porter.
As a white privileged female, I can’t even begin to imagine what it is like for others not in my situation. When I hear the stories of the indigenous people, I am shocked and saddened! I’m trying my best to educate myself to their past by reading at least one book each year from indigenous writers, and I hope I’m respectful of their culture and history in doing so.
Thank you for sharing the truth! 🧡 Every child matters
As a white privileged female, I can’t even begin to imagine what it is like for others not in my situation. When I hear the stories of the indigenous people, I am shocked and saddened! I’m trying my best to educate myself to their past by reading at least one book each year from indigenous writers, and I hope I’m respectful of their culture and history in doing so.
Thank you for sharing the truth! 🧡 Every child matters
December 6, 2024
Author seems somewhat confused about the subject of the book and even references in the end that it was meant to be a story of something else that became this story about her brother. And the change in what it was seems apparent with a last of consistency throughout. I thought I was reading a story of her brother and family and for half of the book I did. The other half was of Rivers and caribou. Also interesting information to learn but not what I expected. I felt like there was a lot missing regarding the story of her family
October 30, 2022
This was a very heavy, uncomfortable read, as it was supposed to be. Michelle writes the story of her brother with special needs in 90s care that describes some pretty horrific conditions. Interwoven in the story is also about the family's distant relative crossing the prairies and their history as well. I struggled a little with the past, but I loved the author's explanation at the end of why she wrote the story.
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October 22, 2022Michelle Porter poetically braids themes without explaining their connection, only asking the reader to trust they are of the same ilk. Inevitably, they are. The result is an immersion in the author’s Métis heritage, buffalos and grasslands, autism’s affect on a family, abuse vs. care, the journey to find a safe group home. Home.
December 31, 2022
What begins as a memoir weaves through questions of mental health, institutional abuse and with Indigenous ways of knowing, particularly of the rivers that define the landscape and realities of the land. Interesting parallels between the environment and the diagnosis of neurodiversity add intriguing insight to this.
March 23, 2023
It was, of course, difficult to listen to the trauma that the author’s brother had to endure, but it was a powerful read. I loved the format of the book, with the interwoven threads of media stories, her own personal recollections, excerpts from her ancestor’s stories etc. It was worth reading even for the bibliography alone.
June 20, 2024
Each stories has its own strengths and weaknesses however the life lessons and experiences of each character is valuable in terms of understanding the culture and one’s perception about certain aspects of either mental illness or social expectations.
December 21, 2025
[Audiobook] This book has the same cadence as Braiding Sweetgrass (which came later), if you’re into that. The treatment of the land is similar, but this book also goes into detail on the horrendous treatment of the author’s disabled brother. Worth a quick listen.
September 20, 2023
So so GOOD!!
May 29, 2025
3.5⭐️
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews