Description
Jaypeetee Arnakak is a linguist, translator, and educator. He spent many years as a policy analyst specializing in Inuit culture, language, and education issues. He is the editor of Unikkaaqtuat Qikiqtaninngaaqtut, a collection of thirty-three versions of traditional stories, transcribed and edited from oral recordings of ten Inuit Elders from two High Arctic communities, Arctic Bay and Igloolik. He has also adapted several traditional Inuit stories into children’s storybooks. Neil Christopher is an educator, author, and filmmaker. He first moved to the North many years ago to help start a high school program in Resolute Bay, Nunavut. It was those students who first introduced Neil to the mythical inhabitants from Inuit traditional stories. The time spent in Resolute Bay changed the course of Neil’s life. Since that first experience in the Arctic, Nunavut has been the only place he has been able to call home. Neil has worked with many community members to record and preserve traditional Inuit stories. Together with his colleague, Louise Flaherty, and his brother, Danny Christopher, Neil started a small publishing company in Nunavut called Inhabit Media Inc., and has since been working to promote Northern stories and authors. Kagan McLeod has been illustrating for magazines, newspapers, and design firms since 1999, after graduating from Sheridan College’s illustration program.
If Tuutarjuk were real, the creature of Inuit stories, Nyla knows she could beat it at making string figures. But late one night, Nyla’s boastfulness is tested when Tuutarjuk appears in her tent. . . .
Nyla loves to make string figures. She’s getting pretty good at making different shapes and sometimes she even makes them when her mom asks her to help out around camp, or late at night when she is supposed to be sleeping.
Nyla’s grandmother warns her that children who play string games when they are not supposed to are at risk of meeting Tuutarjuk, the creature from Inuit stories that challenges children to string games—and carries them off if they don’t win.
Nyla’s sure her grandmother is just kidding. And anyway, if Tuutarjuk were real, Nyla knows she could beat it at making string figures. Late one night, Nyla’s boastfulness is tested when Tuutarjuk appears in her tent.
Will she meet the creature’s challenge, or be carried off into the night?
Audience: Ages 6-8. Full-colour illustrations throughout.