Native American Authors Fiction

Another post for Native American Heritage Month!  Today I am featuring works of fiction written by Native authors.  Enjoy!

Green Grass, Running Water by Thomas King (Cherokee) - Strong, Sassy women and hard-luck hardheaded men, all searching for the middle ground between Native American tradition and the modern world, perform an elaborate dance of approach and avoidance in this magical, rollicking tale. Alberta is a university professor who would like to trade her two boyfriends for a baby but no husband; Lionel is forty and still sells televisions for a patronizing boss; Eli and his log cabin stand in the way of a profitable dam project. These three - and others - are coming to the Blackfoot reservation for the Sun Dance and there they will encounter four Indian elders and their companion, the trickster Coyote - and nothing in the small town of Blossom will be the same again...

Hundred in the Hand by Joseph M. Marshall III (Lakota) - This riveting story takes place during the Battle of the Hundred in the Hand, otherwise known as the Fetterman Massacre of 1866. The story is told alternately through the eyes of Cloud, a dedicated Lakota warrior who fights alongside a young Crazy Horse, and Max Hornsby, a white pioneer who mistakes Cloud's redheaded wife for a captive.

The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse by Louise Erdrich (Anishinaabe) - Old Father Damien lays down his pen and dresses for bed. Slowly, he removes his heavy robes, undergarments and, at last, a bandage wound tightly around a woman's breasts. Having lived for so long as a man, he fears that the discovery of his true identity will undo all that he has accomplished.

Last Standing Woman by Winona LaDuke (Ojibwe Nation) - A powerful and poignant novel tracing the lives of seven generations of Anishinaabe (O)bwe/Chippewa).'...an impressive fiction debut....skillfully intertwines social history. oral myth and character study.

Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson (Haisla & Heiltsuk First Nations) - Five hundred miles north of Vancouver is Kitamaat, an Indian reservation in the homeland of the Haisla people. Growing up a tough, wild tomboy, swimming, fighting, and fishing in a remote village where the land slips into the green ocean on the edge of the world, Lisamarie has always been different. Visited by ghosts and shapeshifters, tormented by premonitions, she can't escape the sense that something terrible is waiting for her. She recounts her enchanted yet scarred life as she journeys in her speedboat up the frigid waters of the Douglas Channel. She is searching for her brother, dead by drowning, and in her own way running as fast as she can toward danger. Circling her brother's tragic death are the remarkable characters that make up her family: Lisamarie's parents, struggling to join their Haisla heritage with Western ways; Uncle Mick, a Native rights activist and devoted Elvis fan; and the headstrong Ma-ma-oo (Haisla for "grandmother"), a guardian of tradition.

Perma Red by Debra Magpie Earling (Bitterroot Salish) - Louise White Elk dreams of both belonging and escape, and of discovering love and freedom on her own terms. But she is a red-haired, tough, and beautiful temptation, and at least three men, each more dangerous than the other, want to control and possess her: Police Officer Charlie Kicking Woman, who struggles between worlds; charismatic but scary Baptiste, who refuses to yield to anyone; and Harvey Stoner, who owns nearly everything. On the reservation, danger looms everywhere, rising out of fear and anger, deprivation, hunger, and poverty. But just as often for Louise, and for those she loves, danger arises from longing and desire. And from making a choice.

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward (Choctaw) - Jojo and his toddler sister, Kayla, live with their grandparents, Mam and Pop, and the occasional presence of their drug-addicted mother, Leonie, on a farm on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. Leonie is simultaneously tormented and comforted by visions of her dead brother, which only come to her when she's high; Mam is dying of cancer; and quiet, steady Pop tries to run the household and teach Jojo how to be a man. When the white father of Leonie's children is released from prison, she packs her kids and a friend into her car and sets out across the state for Parchman farm, the Mississippi State Penitentiary, on a journey rife with danger and promise. 

Solar Storms by Linda Hogan (Chickasaw Nation) - At seventeen, Angela returns to the place where she was raised—a stunning island town that lies at the border of Canada and Minnesota—where she finds that an eager developer is planning a hydroelectric dam that will leave sacred land flooded and abandoned. Joining up with three other concerned residents, Angela fights the project, reconnecting with her ancestral roots as she does so.

Storm of Locusts by Rebecca Roanhorse (Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo) - It's been four weeks since the bloody showdown at Black Mesa, and Maggie Hoskie, Diné monster hunter, is trying to make the best of things. Only her latest bounty hunt has gone sideways, she's lost her only friend, Kai Arviso, and she's somehow found herself responsible for a girl with a strange clan power. Then the Goodacre twins show up at Maggie's door with the news that Kai and the youngest Goodacre, Caleb, have fallen in with a mysterious cult, led by a figure out of Navajo legend called the White Locust. The Goodacres are convinced that Kai's a true believer, but Maggie suspects there's more to Kai's new faith than meets the eye. She vows to track down the White Locust, then rescue Kai and make things right between them. Her search leads her beyond the Walls of Dinétah and straight into the horrors of the Big Water world outside. With the aid of a motley collection of allies, Maggie must battle body harvesters, newborn casino gods and, ultimately, the White Locust himself. But the cult leader is nothing like she suspected, and Kai might not need rescuing after all. When the full scope of the White Locust's plans are revealed, Maggie's burgeoning trust in her friends, and herself, will be pushed to the breaking point, and not everyone will survive. Book 2 of 2 in the Sixth World series 

Trail of the Dead by Joseph Bruchac (Abenaki) - pache teen Lozen and her family are looking for a place of refuge from the despotic Ones who once held them captive and forced Lozen to hunt genetically engineered monsters. Lozen and her allies travel in search of a valley where she and her family once found refuge. But life is never easy in this post-apocalyptic world. When they finally reach the valley, they discover an unpleasant surprise awaiting them--and a merciless hunter following close behind. Hally, their enigmatic Bigfoot friend, points them to another destination--a possible refuge. But can Lozen trust Hally? Relying on her wits and the growing powers that warn her when enemies are near, Lozen fights internal sickness to lead her band of refugees to freedom and safety. Alongside family, new friends, and Hussein, the handsome young man whose life she saved, Lozen forges a path through a barren land where new recombinant monsters lurk and the secrets of this new world will reveal themselves to her . . . whether she wants them to or not. Book 2 of 3 in the Killer of Enemies series