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“Elder Bill Jones breaks our hearts open with his deeply personal exposé of the ongoing trauma inflicted on Indigenous people and their beautiful ancestral forests.” — Suzanne Simard, author of When the Forest Breathes
“Inspirational ... essential teaching for our time.” — Elizabeth May, O.C., M.P.
An inspiring personal transformation through rediscovery of Indigenous self.
“I was lost before I was born”: the starting point of Pacheedaht Elder Bill Jones' lifelong journey of decolonization. “You were all Indigenous once”: the starting point for ending a world based on exploitation and greed.
In 2020–2021, settlers and First Nations people held what became Canada’s largest act of civil disobedience — the Fairy Creek Blockades — in Port Renfrew, British Columbia. During this fight to save some of the province’s and the world’s last remaining old-growth forest, the protesters experienced a collective transformation and were reacquainted with our Great Mother. As Elder Bill sat in a tent during a West Coast storm at the height of the Blockades, he experienced the final phase of his personal decolonization when he had a realization that has informed his life ever since.
Weaving together the stories of Elder Bill’s personal life and those of his ancestors with Elder teachings, settler feminism, and the story of the Blockades, Listening Once Again to Our Great Mother shares wisdom that will inspire readers to reach their own self-awakening, now and for generations to come.
“Inspirational ... essential teaching for our time.” — Elizabeth May, O.C., M.P.
An inspiring personal transformation through rediscovery of Indigenous self.
“I was lost before I was born”: the starting point of Pacheedaht Elder Bill Jones' lifelong journey of decolonization. “You were all Indigenous once”: the starting point for ending a world based on exploitation and greed.
In 2020–2021, settlers and First Nations people held what became Canada’s largest act of civil disobedience — the Fairy Creek Blockades — in Port Renfrew, British Columbia. During this fight to save some of the province’s and the world’s last remaining old-growth forest, the protesters experienced a collective transformation and were reacquainted with our Great Mother. As Elder Bill sat in a tent during a West Coast storm at the height of the Blockades, he experienced the final phase of his personal decolonization when he had a realization that has informed his life ever since.
Weaving together the stories of Elder Bill’s personal life and those of his ancestors with Elder teachings, settler feminism, and the story of the Blockades, Listening Once Again to Our Great Mother shares wisdom that will inspire readers to reach their own self-awakening, now and for generations to come.
Price: $23.99
Pages: 288
Publisher: Dundurn Press
Imprint: Dundurn Press
Publication Date:
29 September 2026
Trim Size: 9.00 X 6.00 in
ISBN: 9781459757912
Format: Paperback
BISACs:
BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Indigenous, Autobiography: general, BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Social Activists, BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Indigenous Peoples of Turtle Island
With the masterful insight and skill of Karen Moe, Elder Bill Jones breaks our hearts open with his deeply personal expose of the ongoing trauma inflicted on Indigenous people and their beautiful ancestral forests by colonial capitalism in Canada. With the deep wisdom that only comes with knowing, Elder Bill leads the undying citizens movement to protect the last of the remaining old growth forests at Fairy Creek in British Columbia. The collective transformation of the people, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, fighting for the trees, and for their own existence, has changed forever the culture of Canada. This book belongs in the curriculum of all students of our Great Mother, and especially in the schools and universities of Canada.
This book is magical because Elder Bill Jones is magical. Not Merlin and wizard kind of magic but the real deep knowledge from the Forest. The teachings of Grandpa Charlie remembered by his grandson, now an Elder of the Pacheedaht, Bill Jones, shared so lovingly with co-author Karen Moe. This is far more than the story of one extraordinary and brave Forest Defenders of Fairy Creek. That protest from Indigenous land defenders and settler culture allies led to the largest number of arrests of any Canadian protest. The teachings of Elder Bill are inspirational. This is myth, legend, theology and philosophy. It is the essential teaching for our time. Listen to your Mother.
Elder Bill Jones is one of the last living connections we have to the intrinsic, spiritual, and physical bonds of the ancient forests of his Pacheedaht homelands. Listening Once Again to Our Great Mother, is a gem — one we must honour, cherish, and pass to every generation that follows. What is at stake will be grieved if we do not act. I am so privileged to know this man and to have walked his breathtaking territories, which he welcomes the world to experience even as they stand on the brink of destruction. Let us follow Bill’s lead: sit in the forest, be quiet, and listen once again. While we still can.
In our deeply troubled present moment, we need some ways to connect past and future. This book (and the trees it describes) are one way to imagine that connection, with old wisdom helping revivify our stale understandings of how to live a life.
Listening Once Again to Our Great Mother is a masterclass in the intimate interconnection of self, place, and non-human kin that is so central to Indigenous worldviews. The clear and grounded voice of Elder Bill Jones provides a critical throughline to a narrative that re-sensitizes us to the discipline of being human and in deep relationship with the places and beings who shape us. And the gentle hand of Karen Moe strengthens a compelling arc of intertwined storytelling that maps both what capitalism and colonization have done to our peoples, and how we can follow ancestral wisdom toward collective healing. Through their words, we understand Fairy Creek not simply as a site of conflict, but as a catalyst for transformation.
A masterfully woven, deeply vital account of the lives of a man, a people, and a forest. This is hard wisdom — hard-won and long-enduring.
This book is magical because Elder Bill Jones is magical. Not Merlin and wizard kind of magic but the real deep knowledge from the Forest. The teachings of Grandpa Charlie remembered by his grandson, now an Elder of the Pacheedaht, Bill Jones, shared so lovingly with co-author Karen Moe. This is far more than the story of one extraordinary and brave Forest Defenders of Fairy Creek. That protest from Indigenous land defenders and settler culture allies led to the largest number of arrests of any Canadian protest. The teachings of Elder Bill are inspirational. This is myth, legend, theology and philosophy. It is the essential teaching for our time. Listen to your Mother.
Elder Bill Jones is one of the last living connections we have to the intrinsic, spiritual, and physical bonds of the ancient forests of his Pacheedaht homelands. Listening Once Again to Our Great Mother, is a gem — one we must honour, cherish, and pass to every generation that follows. What is at stake will be grieved if we do not act. I am so privileged to know this man and to have walked his breathtaking territories, which he welcomes the world to experience even as they stand on the brink of destruction. Let us follow Bill’s lead: sit in the forest, be quiet, and listen once again. While we still can.
In our deeply troubled present moment, we need some ways to connect past and future. This book (and the trees it describes) are one way to imagine that connection, with old wisdom helping revivify our stale understandings of how to live a life.
Listening Once Again to Our Great Mother is a masterclass in the intimate interconnection of self, place, and non-human kin that is so central to Indigenous worldviews. The clear and grounded voice of Elder Bill Jones provides a critical throughline to a narrative that re-sensitizes us to the discipline of being human and in deep relationship with the places and beings who shape us. And the gentle hand of Karen Moe strengthens a compelling arc of intertwined storytelling that maps both what capitalism and colonization have done to our peoples, and how we can follow ancestral wisdom toward collective healing. Through their words, we understand Fairy Creek not simply as a site of conflict, but as a catalyst for transformation.
A masterfully woven, deeply vital account of the lives of a man, a people, and a forest. This is hard wisdom — hard-won and long-enduring.
Elder Bill Jones is a ʔuuštaqyu and holder of First Nations traditions and ritual. He lives in Sooke, British Columbia.
Karen Moe is an artist, feminist activist, and author of Victim: A Feminist Manifesto from a Fierce Survivor. She lives in Lantzville, British Columbia, and in Mexico City.
Karen Moe is an artist, feminist activist, and author of Victim: A Feminist Manifesto from a Fierce Survivor. She lives in Lantzville, British Columbia, and in Mexico City.