I highly recommend Mary Anne Clarke's work for its profound dedication to highlighting the systemic injustices faced by First Nation families within the Canadian Child Welfare system. Her research uniquely incorporates the voices of Kookoma (Grandmothers) who play a crucial role in ensuring the safety, health, and well-being of families and children. Clarke skillfully addresses the challenges Indigenous Governing Bodies and leaders face in asserting jurisdiction over Child and Family Services (CFS), shedding light on how colonial legacies continue to undermine their rights to self-determination. She urges all workers, who play a critical role in CFS social work to be fully aware of the history of genocidal colonization and to ensure the colonization processes in Canada do not continue.

Clarke critiques and analyzes Canada's approach to CFS and raises issues of conflict of power and control. She explores peacebuilding strategies informed by the Kookoma, offering essential insights into addressing systemic issues stemming from genocidal colonization. This compelling work is vital for frontline workers, leaders, policymakers, academics, and students alike, as it calls for urgent changes needed to protect families and children in care. A truly essential read!

Jennie Wastesicoot, University College of the North, Canada

Mary Anne Clarke's Anisininew Grandmothers' Wisdom is a profound and necessary contribution to Indigenous scholarship and child welfare reform. This manuscript stands out for its unwavering commitment to centering the voices of St. Theresa Point Kookoma, whose teachings on peacebuilding and kinship offer a transformative vision for healing the harms of colonial child welfare systems. Clarke's integration of Indigenous methodologies, legal analysis, and peace theory is both innovative and deeply ethical, creating a text that is as rigorous as it is compassionate.

What makes this work particularly compelling is its ability to speak across disciplines-academia, policy, and community-without losing sight of its core purpose: to restore Indigenous matriarchal authority and wisdom to the conversation on child welfare. As a scholar and practitioner in this field, I recognize the significance of Clarke's contributions. This book is not just a critique of systemic injustice; it is a roadmap for meaningful change, grounded in the lived experiences and teachings of those who have endured and resisted these systems. I wholeheartedly endorse this manuscript as an essential resource for students, practitioners, and policymakers alike, and I am confident it will leave a lasting impact on the field of Indigenous child welfare and beyond.

Marlyn Bennett, University of Calgary, Canada

This book clearly and forthrightly articulates the colonial violence embedded within child welfare systems. Grounded in decolonizing perspectives, this work confronts systemic colonial harms while respectfully centering Indigenous Kokoma voices, teachings, and lived realities. It is offered with the hope that those working within colonized systems will listen deeply, reflect critically, and move toward relational accountability, justice, and transformation.

Kathy Absolon, Wilfred Laurier University, Canada