Children’s book by Vera Starbard, Illustrated by Don Starbard
I’m so happy to finally release the fun quarantine project I worked on with my dad – the children’s book “Raven Steals the Toilet Paper.” It’s available for purchase on this link, or below. You can also go to the bottom of this post for the awesome video with narration by Tlingit actor Erin Tripp.
Soon after COVID-19 really started shutting things down, I started to think about how Tlingit people, and our other ancestors, handled pandemics and epidemics not so long ago. Some of that knowledge is available, some of it is assumptions based on the values we see in our culture still. We are taught values like working together, sharing, cleanliness, and listening to those who have knowledge about difficult times.
But I also started thinking about how the not-always-listening Raven might handle today’s situation, and how his friends and cousins might help him through scary times.
But the most fun part about this project was being able to work with my dad! Besides being a gifted artist, my dad – Don Starbard – told me all sorts of stories growing up, both real and imagined. He and my mom read me and my siblings books, but I would often tell them, “Tell me a story with your mouth.” I meant I wanted them to continue that long tradition of oral storytelling. Sometimes this was my dad’s adventures as an Alaska Fish and Wildlife State Trooper, sometimes this was about them growing up in Southeast villages, sometimes it was some story totally made up. But I remember story time being a favorite time of day. And it still is.
So how much better could my first children’s book get than to have my own storytelling dad illustrate it? He did the initial drawing in pen and ink, then sent it to me where I would digitize it and mess with the colors and other things. Over the months we worked on it, I got to know his artistic style even better, and appreciate how he interpreted my words.
I’m excited to finally get to see what people think of it in its published form. Please let me know, and click below to order your own copies!
Click here to purchase “Raven Steals the Toilet Paper” from Lulu.com.
*And please let me know if you’d like to know about wholesale/bulk rates.
Excellent ! thank you RAVEN and Vera.
Gunalchéesh!
Vera, could you please explain to us about the weasels on ‘Making New Nivagi’? Do they really eat wild carrots? Are they really weasels? How do they survive the cold winters? Most weasels eat meat. Could you give us their scientific name so we can research them? Thank you.
Hi – what great questions!
That first question is actually about a mistake in the script that got a little mixed up in the production. I had to cut out five pages worth of writing from my original draft! Weasels are carnivores, and they eat the mice and voles and such that eat the wild carrot or wild potato roots. So the weasels are always digging around the roots looking for mice, and are very active, so they are one thing to look for when you’re looking for these roots. The plant itself can look like some other plants, so a weasel digging around it is a sure sign it’s the right kind of plant. But it’s the mice that actually eat the roots, but they’re way down in the ground. The weasels are up top where we can see them.
Weasels are a little different where Molly is from (and where I live now) than where I was born. The one you see in the episode is a Least Weasel – mustela rixosa. But where I grew up in Alaska we didn’t have these, we had short-tailed weasels – mustela erminea. They are really important to Tlingit people.
In the winter they turn white to camouflage in the snow and are kept warm by their fur and constant running around!