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Basil Johnston's latest collection of Anishinaubaek tales, The Bear-Walker and Other Stories, contains nine tales, as told by three tellers, Basil Johnston, Sam Ozawamik, and Frank Shawbedees, Anishinabae members respectively of the Cape Croker, the Wikwemikong, and the Saugeen First Nation. This precise locating of the tellers is given in the spare introduction, an introduction of only two paragraphs, yet one that manages to remind the reader very quickly that just as Anishinaubaek spelling is not yet standardized, these tales are oral tales that change even as they are recorded. Hence the careful attention to who told Johnston the nine tales, the repeated reminders of the time and place of the telling, e.g., "This is a relatively new story" (15); or "Last winter I heard an old woman telling a story over at Anderson Lake" (28). The name, the place, and the time of the telling are all foregrounded, for another teller in a different time and place would tell a different story. There is no original or pure version. Although readers today may tend to assume that illustrated texts are children's texts, a mistaken assumption similar to the assumption that if native tales are recorded, they must be intended only for children's consumption, Johnston appears indifferent to catering only to the child market. Just as the beautiful paintings by David Johnson that illustrate the tales do not signal in any way that they are aimed specifically at children in that the illustrations are neither cute nor comic (two modes so tiresomely present in children's illustration), Johnston's collection seems intended for both young and old. Both child and adult can learn from these tales, for as the title tale teaches, young people are anxious and in a hurry; some lessons take a long time to sink in. If Johnston does intend a child reader, clearly he is willing to construct that child reader as one who can enjoy tales even if they do not fit neatly and primly into school board objectives. Unlike Nancy Van Laan, for example, who...