Special Collections
#NativeReads for Kids and Teens
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I Can Make This Promise
by Christine DayIn her debut middle grade novel—inspired by her family’s history—Christine Day tells the story of a girl who uncovers her family’s secrets—and finds her own Native American identity. All her life, Edie has known that her mom was adopted by a white couple. So, no matter how curious she might be about her Native American heritage, Edie is sure her family doesn’t have any answers. Until the day when she and her friends discover a box hidden in the attic—a box full of letters signed “Love, Edith,” and photos of a woman who looks just like her. Suddenly, Edie has a flurry of new questions about this woman who shares her name. Could she belong to the Native family that Edie never knew about? But if her mom and dad have kept this secret from her all her life, how can she trust them to tell her the truth now?
The Sea in Winter
by Christine DayIn this evocative and heartwarming novel for readers who loved The Thing About Jellyfish, the author of I Can Make This Promise tells the story of a Native American girl struggling to find her joy again.
It’s been a hard year for Maisie Cannon, ever since she hurt her leg and could not keep up with her ballet training and auditions.
Her blended family is loving and supportive, but Maisie knows that they just can’t understand how hopeless she feels. With everything she’s dealing with, Maisie is not excited for their family midwinter road trip along the coast, near the Makah community where her mother grew up.
But soon, Maisie’s anxieties and dark moods start to hurt as much as the pain in her knee. How can she keep pretending to be strong when on the inside she feels as roiling and cold as the ocean?
Sisters of the Neversea
by Cynthia Leitich SmithFive starred reviews! In this beautifully reimagined story by NSK Neustadt Laureateand New York Times bestselling author Cynthia Leitich Smith (Muscogee Creek), Native American Lily and English Wendy embark on a high-flying journey of magic, adventure, and courage to a fairy-tale island known as Neverland…Lily and Wendy have been best friends since they became stepsisters. But with their feuding parents planning to spend the summer apart, what will become of their family—and their friendship?Little do they know that a mysterious boy has been watching them from the oak tree outside their window. A boy who intends to take them away from home for good, to an island of wild animals, Merfolk, Fairies, and kidnapped children, to a sea of merfolk, pirates, and a giant crocodile.A boy who calls himself Peter Pan.In partnership with We Need Diverse Books
Ancestor Approved
by Cynthia Leitich SmithEdited by award-winning and bestselling author Cynthia Leitich Smith, this collection of intersecting stories by both new and veteran Native writers bursts with hope, joy, resilience, the strength of community, and Native pride.Native families from Nations across the continent gather at the Dance for Mother Earth Powwow in Ann Arbor, Michigan.In a high school gym full of color and song, people dance, sell beadwork and books, and celebrate friendship and heritage. Young protagonists will meet relatives from faraway, mysterious strangers, and sometimes one another (plus one scrappy rez dog).They are the heroes of their own stories.Featuring stories and poems by:Joseph Bruchac Art CoulsonChristine DayEric GansworthCarole LindstromDawn QuigleyRebecca RoanhorseDavid A. RobertsonAndrea L. RogersKim RogersCynthia Leitich SmithMonique Gray SmithTraci Sorell, Tim TingleErika T. WurthBrian YoungIn partnership with We Need Diverse Books
Healer of the Water Monster
by Brian YoungAmerican Indian Youth Literature Award Winner: Best Middle Grade Book!Brian Young’s powerful debut novel tells of a seemingly ordinary Navajo boy who must save the life of a Water Monster—and comes to realize he’s a hero at heart.When Nathan goes to visit his grandma, Nali, at her mobile summer home on the Navajo reservation, he knows he’s in for a pretty uneventful summer, with no electricity or cell service. Still, he loves spending time with Nali and with his uncle Jet, though it’s clear when Jet arrives that he brings his problems with him.One night, while lost in the nearby desert, Nathan finds someone extraordinary: a Holy Being from the Navajo Creation Story—a Water Monster—in need of help.Now Nathan must summon all his courage to save his new friend. With the help of other Navajo Holy Beings, Nathan is determined to save the Water Monster, and to support Uncle Jet in healing from his own pain.The Heartdrum imprint centers a wide range of intertribal voices, visions, and stories while welcoming all young readers, with an emphasis on the present and future of Indian Country and on the strength of young Native heroes. In partnership with We Need Diverse Books.
How I Became A Ghost
by Tim Tingle and Steven WalkerA Choctaw boy tells the story of his tribe's removal from the only land his people had ever known, and how their journey to Oklahoma led him to become a ghost--one with the ability to help those he left behind.
Indian Shoes
by Cynthia Leitich SmithThe beloved chapter book by New York Times bestselling author Cynthia Leitich Smith about the love and adventures shared by a Cherokee-Seminole boy and his Grampa now has brand-new illustrations! A perfect pick for new readers.What do Indian shoes look like, anyway? Like beautiful beaded moccasins... or hightops with bright orange shoelaces?Ray Halfmoon prefers hightops, but he gladly trades them for a nice pair of moccasins for his grampa. After all, it's Grampa Halfmoon who's always there to help Ray get in and out of scrapes—like the time they teamed up to pet sit for the whole block during a holiday blizzard!Award-winning author Cynthia Leitich Smith writes with wit and candor about a boy and his grandfather, sharing all their love, joy, and humor.In partnership with We Need Diverse Books
In the Footsteps of Crazy Horse
by Joseph MarshallJoseph Marshall traces Crazy Horse's life from birth to his emergence as a warrior in the early 1860s, describing his childhood exploits, training, the overall circumstances of his upbringing, and accomplishments as a warrior and military and civilian leader. Through his grandfather's tales about the famous warrior, Jimmy learns more about his Lakota heritage and, ultimately, himself.
The Birchbark House
by Louise ErdrichOmakayas, a seven-year-old Native American girl of the Ojibwa tribe, lives through the joys of summer and the perils of winter on an island in Lake Superior in 1847.
[This text is listed as an example that meets Common Core Standards in English language arts in grades 4-5 at http://www.corestandards.org.]
Indian No More
by Charlene Willing McManis and Traci SorellRegina Petit's family has always been Umpqua, and living on the Grand Ronde Tribe's reservation is all ten-year-old Regina has ever known. Her biggest worry is that Sasquatch may actually exist out in the forest. But when the federal government enacts a law that says Regina's tribe no longer exists, Regina becomes "Indian no more" overnight--even though she lives with her tribe and practices tribal customs, and even though her ancestors were Indian for countless generations.
The Legend of the White Buffalo Woman
by Paul GobleIn this most important of all Lakota legends--and a vivid invocation of the magic of the Plains Indian culture--Paul Goble brings to life the story of a mysterious and wonderful gift. Full color.
Two Roads
by Joseph BruchacA boy discovers his Native American heritage in this Depression-era tale of identity and friendship by the author of Code Talker
It's 1932, and twelve-year-old Cal Black and his Pop have been riding the rails for years after losing their farm in the Great Depression.
Cal likes being a "knight of the road" with Pop, even if they're broke. But then Pop has to go to Washington, DC--some of his fellow veterans are marching for their government checks, and Pop wants to make sure he gets his due--and Cal can't go with him.
So Pop tells Cal something he never knew before: Pop is actually a Creek Indian, which means Cal is too. And Pop has decided to send Cal to a government boarding school for Native Americans in Oklahoma called the Challagi School. At school, the other Creek boys quickly take Cal under their wings.
Even in the harsh, miserable conditions of the Bureau of Indian Affairs boarding school, he begins to learn about his people's history and heritage. He learns their language and customs. And most of all, he learns how to find strength in a group of friends who have nothing beyond each other.
Everything You Wanted To Know About Indians But Were Afraid To Ask
by Anton TreuerIn matter-of-fact responses to over 120 questions, both thoughtful and outrageous, modern and historical, Ojibwe scholar and cultural preservationist Anton Treuer gives a frank, funny, and sometimes personal tour of what's up with Indians, anyway. --What is the real story of Thanksgiving? --Why are tribal languages important? --What do you think of that incident where people died in a sweat lodge? White/Indian relations are often characterized by guilt and anger. Everything You Wanted to Know about Indians but Were Afraid to Ask cuts through the emotion and builds a foundation for true understanding and positive action.
The Window
by Michael DorrisWhen ten-year-old Rayona's Native American mother enters a treatment facility, her estranged father, a black man, finally introduces her to his side of the family, who are not at all what she expected.
Skeleton Man
by Joseph BruchacTrust your dreams. Both my parents said that. That's our old way, our Mohawk way. The way of our ancestors. Trust the little voice that speaks to you. That is your speaking. But when those feelings, those dreams, those voices are so confusing, what do you do then? "Help," I whisper. "Help."I'm not sure who I'm talking to when I say that, but I hope they're listening.Ever since Molly woke up one morning and discovered that her parents vanished, she has had to depend on herself to survive -- and find the reason for their disappearance.Social Services has turned her over to the care of a great-uncle, a mysterious man Molly has never met before. Then Molly starts having dreams about the Skeleton Man from a spooky old Mohawk tale her father used to tell her...dreams that are trying to tell her something...dreams that might save her, if only she can understand them.
The Girl Who Married the Moon
by Gayle Ross and Joseph BruchacA collection of Native American stories of girls becoming women. These are stories from a broad array of tribes and tradtions.
Waterlily
by Ella Cara DeloriaWaterlily is a novel of Indian life---of the Dakotas, or Sioux. But apart from dealing with an actual people at a more-or-less-identifiable time and place, it has little in common with the conventional historical fiction centered on famous people and major events. For the book was written by Ella Deloria, herself a Sioux and an accomplished ethnologist, who sought to record and preserve traditional Sioux ways through this imaginative recreation of life in the camp circle. It is of special value because it is told from a woman's perspective---one that is much less well known than the warrior's or the holy man's. More fully and compellingly than any ethnological report, and with equal authority, it reveals the intricate system of relatedness, obligation, and respect that governed the world of all Dakotas as it takes the protagonist, Waterlily, through the everyday and the extraordinary events of a Sioux woman's experience.
Indian Shoes
by Cynthia Leitich SmithTogether with Grampa, Ray Halfmoon, a Seminole-Cherokee boy, finds creative and amusing solutions to life's challenges.