Racism and Apathy along the “Highway of Tears”, Bitch Media, Nov. 27, 2019
The stories of violence and indifference in Highway of Tears are devastating. McDiarmid calls attention to issues like homelessness, substance abuse, or juvenile delinquency not as personal failures, but as products of systemic violence and a failure of the Canadian government. She deeply humanizes girls and women who are often blamed—by the police, the media, and their own communities—for their own victimhood.
Indigenous Women Keep Going Missing Along This Highway. This Writer Investigated Why, Refinery 29, Nov. 25, 2019
[McDiarmid] draws attention to individual stories of victims in order to personalize these cases against faceless statistics. While exploring the devastating effect these tragedies have on victims’ families and communities, McDiarmid also highlights the unwavering determination of indigenous communities to fight for justice and the return of their missing girls and women.
Highway of Tears proves yet again that our marginalized communities are over-policed and under-protected, and it is as captivating as it is thought-provoking.
If you read one book this month, make it Highway of Tears, The Week, Nov. 19, 2019
Canadian journalist Jessica McDiarmid’s new investigative book, Highway of Tears, out now, seeks to right decades of indifference by putting the female victims front and center at last. The result is urgent and eye-opening, and one of only a few book-length efforts to understand the epidemic. Its conclusions are uncomfortable at best, and damning at worst; it is easily one of the most essential works of nonfiction of the year.
A New Book Investigates B.C.’s Missing Native Women, Outside Online, Nov. 19, 2019
The girls’ families do trust McDiarmid … and that serves an essential purpose. It allows readers to know the impact of these devastating crimes. Years later, the families whose daughters, sisters, and nieces have never been found continue to suffer. These, I thought, were some of most affecting moments in the book. I cried when I read that one despondent mother, after years of searching for her daughter and trying to compel public attention for her case, slowly drank herself to death. Their guilt is heartbreaking.
Highway of Tears Reveals How Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Are Denied Justice, Paste Magazine, Nov. 13, 2019
The women and girls lost on the Highway of Tears haven’t received the justice they deserve. But in telling their stories and shining a light on the justice system and society that have failed them, McDiarmid hopes that change will finally happen—beginning with us.
When Will We Pay Attention to Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women? Literary Hub, Nov. 14, 2019
Indigenous women and girls face more violence than anyone else … As one long-time activist put it, “Every time we walk out our doors, it’s high risk.”
Across Canada, as across the Highway of Tears, no one has counted the dead. But whatever the number, too often forgotten is that behind every single death or disappearance is a human being and those who love them, a web of family and community and friendship, those bonds we form that make us strong; those bonds that, when broken, tear us apart.
Reads for the Rest of Us, Ms. Magazine, Nov. 5, 2019
Thousands of Indigenous girls and women have gone missing or been found murdered across the US and Canada over the last few decades. Canadian journalist Jessica McDiarmid’s debut book is an in-depth investigation into the lives and stories of some of the victims lost along Canada’s Highway 16, dubbed the “Highway of Tears” due to its violent reputation. Meticulously researched and heartbreakingly readable, the book calls out the tragedy and travesty behind the crisis along the Highway of Tears.
