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Native American art | History, Styles, & Facts | Britannica

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Table of Contents

Native American art, also called American Indian art, the visual art of the aboriginal inhabitants of the Americas, often called American Indians. For a further discussion of the visual art of the Americas produced in the period after European contact, see Latin American art.

The nature and elements of Native American art

The role of the artist

The very use of the word art suggests one of the basic differences between European or European-derived and American Indian concepts. For not only did few American Indian groups allow art to become a major way of life, as in the West, but many Native American languages even lack a term meaning "art" or "artist." If one wished to refer to a beautiful basket or a well-carved sculpture, it was usually necessary to rely upon such terms as "well-done," "effective," or perhaps "powerful" (in the magical sense). And the concept of an artist was largely of a person who was simply better at the job than was another. Generally, artists were accorded special significance only where wealth was a major factor in the culture. The elite of many cultures, whether wealthy in their own right or (more commonly) by having attained a high religious office, supported groups of artists who produced memorial and religious art.

Although American Indian people may not have considered artistic skill in terms of a vocation, the difference between a well-woven basket and a careless piece of work or a particularly well-designed carving and a crudely made example did not go unnoticed. Fine workmanship commanded a premium long before European contact, and with the advent of the monetary system, it was even more highly prized.

Collective versus individual art

The basic role of the American Indian artist is the same as that of the artist in any culture: to arouse an emotional response in his or her audience. In Native American cultures, the artist's ability to communicate successfully depended largely upon the recognition of the force of tradition. The social organization of the various tribes allowed less latitude for experimentation than Western cultures and usually compelled the artist to work in familiar channels. Yet, within this rigid framework of tradition, there was sometimes a surprising degree of freedom of expression. There are recorded instances of individuals having made considerable changes in the art (and the economy) of their tribes. In North America, perhaps the most striking have been the careers of Nampeyó, the famed Hopi potter, and María Martínez and Julián Martínez, of San Ildefonso pueblo. Through sheer individual talent these people achieved a personal triumph by developing a style that not only was copied by other artists but in time also was regarded as "traditional" in that particular village. Although there is no way of knowing how often this happened in the past, there are suggestions that it occurred at Mimbres, among the Haida slate carvers, and quite possibly in some areas of the so-called Mound Builder cultures of the Southeast.

Origins of designs

The origins of most Native American decorative designs cannot be traced accurately today; most of them are lost in antiquity. Many obviously came from natural forms, while others are simple developments of geometric or lineal motifs. Some have become so interwoven with alien concepts-Western, after the advent of the European, for example-that it is impossible to completely unravel their sources. There is evidence, however, that some of the original forms were creations of individual artists and were often the result of a vision quest. To the American Indian the world of the vision quest is mysterious, a place where the soul can leave the body, participate in many strange activities, and see many unusual sights. Since many of the designs seen or creatures encountered during the vision quest are regarded as protective forms or spirit-beings, these would be carefully re-created during waking hours. Non-artists would occasionally describe their dream creatures to a designated artist so that they could be recorded on hide, in wood, or in stone. But since these supernatural visions were extremely personal, they were usually recorded by the individual; hence, they vary tremendously in aesthetic quality.

Because art designs were regarded as personal property, an artist could buy a design or receive it as a gift from its creator, but to appropriate and use it for his or her own purposes was taboo.

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Native American art | History, Styles, & Facts

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Native American art, the visual art of the aboriginal inhabitants of the Americas, often called American Indians. Though there are a great variety of forms and designs in American Indian art, many art objects are often intended to perform a service-for example, to act as a container or to provide a means of worship.

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Native American Art Magazine

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A monthly magazine and website specially written for collectors, galleries and painters of traditional fine art.

Articles emphasize mainstream art by today's favorite artists.

See what galleries are showing nationwide each month.

Find new artists to collect in a specific art destination.

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A bimonthly Magazine is designed to provide collectors of historic American paintings, sculpture and drawings with all the necessary information they need to acquire new works of art.A bimonthly magazine and website specially designed to help you market new works of Historic and Contemporary Native American Art to collectors nationwide.

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Recipes | First Nations Development Institute

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Recipes | First Nations Development Institute

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Bring a Bit of Native America to Your Table!
First Nations Development Institute – with the help of some of our great grantees – is offering cookbooks and recipes from Native American tribes and organizations. Preparing some of these dishes is a great way to bring a delicious taste of Native Amer…

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Indigenous cuisine of the Americas - Wikipedia

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Native American cuisine includes all cuisines and food practices of the indigenous peoples of the Americas. Contemporary Native peoples retain a varied culture of traditional foods, along with the addition of some post-contact foods that have become customary and even iconic of present-day Native American social gatherings (for example, frybread). Foods like cornbread, turkey, cranberry, blueberry, hominy and mush have been adopted into the cuisine of the broader United States population from Native American cultures. In other cases, documents from the early periods of Native American contact with European, African, and Asian peoples have allowed the recovery and revitalization of indigenous food practices that had formerly passed out of popularity. The most important Native American crops have generally included corn, beans, squash, pumpkins, sunflowers, wild rice, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, peanuts, avocados, papayas, potatoes and cacao.

Native American food and cuisine is recognized by its use of indigenous domesticated and wild food ingredients. As the Americas cover a large range of biomes, and there are over 500 currently recognized Native American tribes in the US alone, Native American cuisine can vary significantly by region and culture. For example, North American Native cuisine differs from Southwestern and Mexican cuisine in its simplicity and directness of flavor. The use of ramps, wild ginger, miners' lettuce, and juniper berry can impart subtle flavours to various dishes.

In traditional tribal societies, the gathering of shellfish, wild plants, berries and seeds is often done by women. Bison have traditionally been an important source of food for the Plains Indians in the area between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains. Recipes were initially passed down through oral tradition. Over a period of hundreds of years, some tribes migrated into different climate zones, so by the time European settlers recorded these recipes the cuisine had probably adapted to use local ingredients. Some anthropologists propose that the southwestern Eastern Pueblo, Hopi and Zuni may have retained more of the original elements.

Country food, in Canada, refers to the traditional diets of the Indigenous peoples in Canada (known in Canada as First Nations, Metis, and Inuit), especially in remote northern regions where Western food is an expensive import, and traditional foods are still relied upon.

The Government of the Northwest Territories estimated in 2015 that nearly half of Northwest Territories residents in smaller communities relied on country food for 75% of their meat and fish intake, in larger communities the percentage was lower, with the lowest percentage relying on country foods (4%) being in Yellowknife, the capital and only "large community". The most common country foods in the Northwest Territories' area include mammals and birds (caribou, moose, ducks, geese, seals, hare, grouse, ptarmigan), fish (lake trout, char, inconnu (coney), whitefish, pike, burbot) and berries (blueberries, cranberries, blackberries, cloudberries).

In the eastern Canadian Arctic, Inuit consume a diet of foods that are fished, hunted, and gathered locally. This may include caribou, walrus, ringed seal, bearded seal, beluga whale, polar bear, berries, and fireweed.

The cultural value attached to certain game species, and certain parts, varies. For example, in the James Bay region, a 1982 study found that beluga whale meat was principally used as dog food, whereas the blubber, or muktuk was a "valued delicacy". Value also varies by age, with Inuit preferring younger ring seals, and often using the older ones for dog food.

Contaminants in country foods are a public health concern in Northern Canada; volunteers are tested to track the spread of industrial chemicals from emitters (usually in the South) into the northern food web via the air and water.

In 2017, the Government of the Northwest Territories committed to using country foods in the soon-to-open Stanton Territorial Hospital, despite the challenges of obtaining, inspecting, and preparing sufficient quantities of wild game and plants.

In Southern Canada, wild foods (especially meats) are relatively rare in restaurants, due to wildlife conservation rules against selling hunted meat, as well as strict meat inspection rules. There is a cultural divide between rural and remote communities that rely on wild foods, and urban Canadians (the majority), who have little or no experience with them.

The essential staple foods of the Indigenous peoples of the Eastern Woodlands have traditionally been corn (also known as maize), beans, and squash, known as " The Three Sisters" because they were planted interdependently: the beans grew up the tall stalks of the corn, while the squash spread out at the base of the three plants and provided protection and support for the root systems.

Maple syrup is another essential food staple of the Eastern Woodlands peoples. Tree sap is collected from sugar maple trees during the beginning of springtime when the nights are still cold. Birch bark containers are used in the process of making maple syrup, maple cakes, maple sugar, and maple taffy. When the sap is boiled to a certain temperature, the different variations of maple food products are created. When the sap starts to thicken, it can be poured into the snow to make taffy.

Since the early English colonists of New England had to adapt their foods to the local crops and resources, the Native influences of Southern New England Algonquian cuisine form a significant part of New England cuisine with dishes such as cornbread, succotash and Johnnycakes and ingredients such as corn, cranberries and local species of clam still enjoyed in the region today.

Southeastern Native American culture has formed the cornerstone of Southern cuisine from its origins till the present day. From Southeastern Native American culture came one of the main staples of the Southern diet: corn ( maize), either ground into meal or limed with an alkaline salt to make hominy, using a Native American technique known as nixtamalization. Corn is used to make all kinds of dishes from the familiar cornbread and grits to liquors such as whiskey, which has been an important trade item, historically. Though a less important staple, potatoes were also adopted from Native American cuisine and have been used in many ways similar to corn. Native Americans introduced the first non-Native American Southerners to many other vegetables still familiar on southern tables. Squash, pumpkin, many types of beans, tomatoes, many types of peppers, and sassafras all came to the settlers via Indigenous peoples.

Many fruits are available in this region. Muscadines, blackberries, raspberries, and many other wild berries were part of Southern Native Americans' diet.

To a far greater degree than anyone realizes, several of the most important food dishes of the Southeastern Indians live on today in the "soul food" eaten by both black and white Southerners. Hominy, for example, is still eaten ... Sofkee live on as grits ... cornbread [is] used by Southern cooks ... Indian fritters ... variously known as "hoe cake", ... or "Johnny cake." ... Indians boiled cornbread is present in Southern cuisine as "corn meal dumplings", ... and as "hush puppies", ... Southerns cook their beans and field peas by boiling them, as did the Indians ... like the Indians they cure their meat and smoke it over hickory coals.

Southeastern Native Americans traditionally supplement their diets with meats derived from the hunting of native game. Venison has always been an important meat staple, due to the abundance of white-tailed deer in the area. Rabbits, squirrels, opossums, and raccoons are also common. Livestock, adopted from Europeans, in the form of hogs and cattle, are also kept. Aside from the more commonly consumed parts of the animal, it is traditional to also eat organ meats such as liver, brains, and intestines. This tradition remains today in hallmark dishes like chitterlings, commonly called chitlins, which are the fried large intestines of hogs; livermush, a common dish in the Carolinas made from hog liver; and pork brains and eggs. The fat of the animals, particularly of hogs, is traditionally rendered and used for cooking and frying. Many of the early settlers were taught Southeastern Native American cooking methods.

Selected dishes

Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains and Canadian Prairies or Plains Indians have historically relied heavily on American bison (American buffalo) as a staple food source. One traditional method of preparation is to cut it into thin slices and then dry it, either over a slow fire or in the hot sun, until it is hard and brittle. In this form it can last for months, making it a main ingredient to be combined with other foods, or eaten on its own. One such use could be pemmican, a concentrated mixture of fat and protein, and fruits such as cranberries, Saskatoon berries, blueberries, cherries, chokecherries, and currants are sometimes added. Many parts of the bison were utilized and prepared in numerous ways, including: "boiled meat, tripe soup perhaps thickened with brains, roasted intestines, jerked/smoked meat, and raw kidneys, liver, tongue sprinkled with gall or bile were eaten immediately after a kill. The animals that Great Plains Indians consumed, like bison, deer, and antelope, were grazing animals. Due to this, they were high in omega-3 fatty acids, an essential acid that many diets lack. When asked to state traditional staple foods, a group of Plains elders identified "prairie turnips, fruits (chokecherries, June berries, plums, blueberries, cranberries, strawberries, buffalo berries, gooseberries), potatoes, squash, dried meats (venison, buffalo, jack rabbit, pheasant, and prairie chicken), and wild rice" as being these staple foods.

Selected dishes

In the Pacific Northwest, traditional diets include salmon and other fish, seafood, mushrooms, berries, and meats such as deer, duck, and rabbit. In contrast to the Easterners, the Northwestern peoples are traditionally hunter-gatherers, primarily. The generally mild climate led to the development of an economy based on year-round abundant food supplies, rather than having to rely upon seasonal agriculture. In what is now California, acorns can be ground into a flour that has at times served as the principal foodstuff for about 75 percent of the population, and dried meats can be prepared during the dry season.

Ancestral Puebloans of the present-day Four Corners region of the United States, comprising Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah, initially practiced subsistence agriculture by cultivating maize, beans, squash, sunflower seeds, and pine nuts from the pinyon pine, and game meat including venison and cuniculture, and freshwater fish such as Rio Grande cutthroat trout and rainbow trout are also traditional foods in the region. Ancestral Puebloans are also known for their basketry and pottery, indicating both an agricultural surplus that needed to be carried and stored, and clay pot cooking. Grinding stones have been used to grind maize into meal for cooking. Archaeological digs indicate a very early domestication of turkeys for food.

New Mexican cuisine is heavily rooted in both Pueblo and Hispano food traditions, and is a prevalent cuisine in the American Southwest, it is especially prevalent in New Mexico.

The 2002 Foods of the Southwest Indian Nations won a James Beard Award, the first Native American cookbook so honored. Publishers had told the author, Lois Ellen Frank, that there was no such thing as Native American cuisine.

Alaska native cuisine consists of nutrient-dense foods such as seal, fish (salmon), and moose. Along with these, berries (huckleberries) and bird eggs are traditionally consumed by Alaska Natives. Seal, walruses, and polar bear are other large game that Alaska Natives hunt. Smaller game includes whitefish, arctic char, arctic hares, and ptarmigan. Due to weather, edible plants like berries are only available to be consumed in the summer, so the people have a diet very high in fat and protein, but low in carbohydrates. The game that is hunted is also used for clothing. The intestines of large mammals are used to make waterproof clothing and caribou fur is used to make warm clothing.

Acorn bread

Akutaq, also called "Eskimo ice cream", made from caribou or moose tallow and meat, berries, seal oil, and sometimes fish, whipped together with snow or water

Bannock, a bread of European origin, cooked over an open fire

Bean bread, made with corn meal and beans, popular among the Cherokee

Black drink or asi, a Southeastern ceremonial drink made from the yaupon holly

Buffalo stew, from the Lakota and Cherokee people, also called tanka-me-a-lo

Chinook olives, a type of cured acorn eaten by the aboriginal people of the Columbia River Valley

Cornbread and corn pone-the word pone derives from the word for 'bread' in some Eastern Algonquian languages, such as Powhatan apon and Lenape ahpòn

Filé powder, made from sassafras leaves, used by the Choctaw for flavoring and thickening soups and stews as well as for herbal medicine

Frybread, a dish made from ingredients distributed to Native Americans living on reservations

Green chili stew

Hopi tea, an herbal tea made from Thelesperma megapotamicum

Mutton stew, from the Navajo people

Pemmican, a concentrated food consisting of dried pulverized meat, dried berries, and rendered fat.

Piki bread, from the Hopi people

Psindamoakan, a Lenape hunter's food made of parched cornmeal mixed with maple sugar

Pueblo bread

Salted salmon, an Inuit dish of brined salmon in a heavy concentration of salt water, left for months to soak up salts

Stink fish, an Inuit dish of dried fish, kept underground until ripe, for later consumption; also done with fish heads

Succotash, a dish of beans and corn

Tiswin, a term used for several fermented beverages in the Southwest, including a corn or fruit beer of the Apache and a saguaro fruit beer of the Tohono O'odham

Walrus flipper soup, an Inuit dish made from walrus flippers

Wojapi, a Plains Indian pudding of mashed, cooked berries

This region comprises the cultures of the Arawaks, the Caribs, and the Ciboney. The Taíno of the Greater Antilles were the first New World people to encounter Columbus. Prior to European contact, these groups foraged, hunted, and fished. The Taíno cultivated cassava, sweet potato, maize, beans, squash, pineapple, peanut, and peppers. Today these cultural groups have mostly assimilated into the surrounding population, but their culinary legacy lives on.

Ajiaco, same as pepperpot, a soup believed to have originated in Cuba before Columbus' arrival. The soup mixes a variety of meats, tubers, and peppers.

Barbacoa, the origin of the English word barbecue, a method of slow-grilling meat over a fire pit;

Jerk, a style of cooking meat that originated with the Taíno of Jamaica. Meat was applied with a dry rub of allspice, Scotch bonnet pepper, and perhaps additional spices, before being smoked over fire or wood charcoal.

Casabe, a crispy, thin flatbread made from cassava root widespread in the Pre-Columbian Caribbean and Amazonia;

Bammy, a Jamaican bread made from cassava and water; Today this bread is fried and made with coconut milk.

Pasteles, this dish may have also been called and originated from Puerto Rico. Pasteles were once made with cassava and taro mashed into a onto a taro leaf. They are then stuffed with meat and wrapped.

Funche or fungi, a cornmeal mush;

Cassareep, a sauce, condiment, or thickening agent made by boiling down the extracted juices of bitter cassava root;

Mama Juana, a tea made in Hispaniola (Dominican Republic and Haiti).

Pepperpot, a spicy stew of Taíno origin based on meat, vegetables, chili peppers, and boiled-down cassava juice, with a legacy stretching from Cuba, Colombia coast and to Guyana;

Bush teas, popular as herbal remedies in the Virgin Islands and other parts of the Caribbean, often derived from indigenous sources, such as ginger thomas, soursop, inflammation bush, kenip, wormgrass, worry wine, and many other leaves, barks, and herbs;

Ouicou, a fermented, cassava-based beer brewed by the Caribs of the Lesser Antilles;[citation needed ]

Taumali or taumalin, a Carib sauce made from the green liver meat of lobsters, chile pepper, and lime juice.

The pre- conquest cuisine of the Native Americans of Mesoamerica made a major contribution to shaping modern-day Mexican cuisine, Salvadoran cuisine, Honduran cuisine, Guatemalan cuisine. The cultures involved included the Aztec, Maya, Olmec, Pipil and many more (see the List of pre-Columbian civilizations).

This currently includes recipes known from the Quechua, Aymara and Nazca of the Andes.

Grilled guinea pig, a native to most of the Andes region, this small rodent has been cultivated for at least 4000 years.

Fried green tomatoes, a nightshade relative native to Peru;

Saraiaka, a corn liquor;

Chicha, a generic name for any number of indigenous beers found in South America. Though chichas made from various types of corn are the most common in the Andes, chicha in the Amazon Basin frequently use manioc. Variations found throughout the continent can be based on amaranth, quinoa, peanut, potato, coca, and many other ingredients.

Chicha morada, a Peruvian, sweet, unfermented drink made from purple corn, fruits, and spices.

Colada morada, a thickened, spiced fruit drink based on the Andean blackberry, traditional to the Day of the Dead ceremonies held in Ecuador, it is typically served with guagua de pan, a bread shaped like a swaddled infant (formerly made from cornmeal in Pre-Columbian times), though other shapes can be found in various regions.

Ch'arki, a type of dried meat.

Humitas, similar to modern-day Tamales, a thick mixture of corn, herbs and onion, cooked in a corn-leaf wrapping. The name is modern, meaning bow-tie, because of the shape in which it's wrapped.

Locro (from the Quechua ruqru) is a hearty thick stew popular along the Andes mountain range. It one of the national dishes of Argentina and Bolivia.

Masamora morada, a thick, sweet pudding made from ground purple corn and fruit. Sold in mix form in Peru.

Mate de coca, a Peruvian tea made from steeped coca leaves. It is commonly sipped by indigenous people living at high altitudes in the Andes to prevent elevation illnesses.

Pachamanca, stew cooked in a hautía oven;

Papas a la Huancaína, Peruvian potatoes covered in a spicy, peanut-based sauce called Huancaína (Wan-ka-EE-na) sauce.

Pataska, spicy stew made from boiled maize, potatoes, and dried meat.

Ceviche, raw fish marinated in lime juice. One of Peru's national dishes.

Cancha or tostada, fried golden hominy.

Llapingachos, mashed-potato cakes from Ecuador;

Tocosh (Togosh), a traditional Quechua food prepared from fermented potato pulp.

Angu, an indigenous Brazilian type of corn mush

Bori-bori, a Paraguayan soup with cornmeal dumplings.

Cauim, a fermented beverage based on maize or manioc broken down by the enzymes of human saliva, traditional to the Tupinambá and other indigenous peoples of Brazil

Curanto, a Chilean stew cooked in an earthen oven originally from the Chono people of Chiloé Island

Kaguyjy, a Guarani-derived locro corn mush that become part of the national Paraguayan cuisine.

Kiveve, a sweet or savory dish from Paraguay consisting of pureed pumpkin and other ingredients cooked over a fire.

Lampreado or payaguá mascada, a starchy, manioc-based fried cake from Paraguay and the northeast of Argentina.

Lapacho or taheebo, a medicinal tree bark infusion

Maniçoba, dish of boiled manioc leaves and smoked meat indigenous to the Brazilian Amazon

Mate (beverage)

Mbeju, a pan-cooked cake utilizing manioc starch.

Mocotó, a Brazilian stew with cow's feet, beans, and vegetables.

Moqueca, a Brazilian seafood stew

Paçoca, from the Tupi "to crumble," describes two different dishes of pulverized ingredients: one with peanuts and sugar, and the other with dried meat, ground manioc, and onion.

Pamonha, a Brazilian tamale

Pira caldo, Paraguayan fish soup

Sopa paraguaya, a corn flour casserole esteemed as the national dish of Paraguay, related to chipa guasu.

Soyo, shortened from the Guarani name "so'o josopy," a Paraguayan soup based on meat crushed in a mortar.

Tacacá, a Brazilian stew of tucupi, jambu leaves, and shrimp, typically served in a dried gourd.

Tereré or ka'ay, a cold-brewed version of yerba mate

Yerba mate, a tea made from the holly of the same name, derived from Guaraní

The earliest utensils, including bowls, knives, spoons, grinders, and griddles, were made from all kinds of materials, such as rock and animal bone. Gourds were also initially cultivated, hollowed, and dried to be used as bowls, spoons, ladles, and storage containers. Many Native American cultures also developed elaborate pottery traditions for making bowls and cooking pots, and basketry for making containers. Nobility in the Andean and Mesoamerican civilizations were even known to have utensils and vessels smelted from gold, silver, copper, or other minerals.

Batan, an Andean grinding slab used in conjunction with a small stone uña

Burén, a clay griddle used by the Taíno

Comal, a griddle used since Pre-Columbian times in Mexico and Central America for a variety of purposes, especially to cook tortillas

Cuia, a gourd used for drinking mate in South America

Metate, a stone grinding slab used with a stone mano or metlapil to process meal in Mesoamerica and one of the most notable Pre-Columbian artifacts in Costa Rica

Molinillo, a device used by Mesoamerican royalty for frothing cacao drinks

Molcajete, a basalt stone bowl, used with a tejolote to grind ingredients as a Mesoamerican form of mortar and pestle

Paila, an Andean earthenware bowl

Cooking baskets were woven from a variety of local fibers and sometimes coated with clay to improve durability. The notable thing about basket cooking and some native clay pot cooking is that the heat source, i.e. hot stones or charcoal, is used inside the utensil rather than outside. (also see Cookware and bakeware)

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Native American cuisine includes all cuisines and food practices of the indigenous peoples of the Americas. Contemporary Native peoples retain a varied culture of traditional foods, along with the addition of some post-contact foods that have become customary and even iconic of present-day Native American social gatherings (for example, frybread).

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Virtual Storytime: FRY BREAD with Kevin Noble Maillard - YouTube

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Virtual Storytime: FRY BREAD with Kevin Noble Maillard

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Native-Land.ca | Our home on native land

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Mapping

We strive to map Indigenous territories, treaties, and languages across the world in a way that goes beyond colonial ways of thinking in order to better represent how Indigenous people want to see themselves.

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Native Land is a resource to learn more about Indigenous territories, languages, lands, and ways of life. We welcome you to our site.

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American Indian Youth Literature Award - American Indian Library Association (ailanet.org)

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14 Contemporary Books By Native American Writers To Get Excited About (buzzfeednews.com)

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From the Hilltop by Toni Jensen (University of Nebraska Press; out now)

This set of stories is one of the few - by a Native author or by any author - that seems to be able to pull off that cool-kid experimental thing and make it seem sharp and compelling. There are some great stories in the collection by Métis author Jensen, but my personal favorite is the title story.

Cheyenne Madonna by Eddie Chuculate (Black Sparrow Press; out now)

This collection packs a punch and a half with sharply written, voice-driven stories about being members of the Cherokee and Muscogee (Creek) nations in Oklahoma, which the author has in common with his characters. Some will make you squirm in that good way: "Under the Red Star of Mars" is about a woman who gets away from her abusive boyfriend - enlisting her new man to do so - but you're left wondering who the good guy in all of this is supposed to be. Then there's "Yo Yo," a brutal coming-of-age tale that illustrates the sometimes deeply anti-black feeling that some Native people have, especially in Oklahoma - a state with a complex history surrounding the relationship between Native folks and black people. Chuculate is a guy with some impressive cred: He attended the famous Iowa Writers' Workshop and was granted a Wallace Stegner Fellowship. This collection is a winner.

Robopocalypse by Daniel H. Wilson (Vintage; out now)

This is not Wilson's first time at the robot rodeo - but it's a crowd favorite because Robopocalypse is just that damn good. Set in the not-too-distant future, this novel (similar to many of his others) asks what kind of role we want technology to play in our lives. In the novel, technology is destroying humankind - through a master computer called Archos that's gained not only sentience but quick control over most other computers across the world. The one relatively safe place as the planet starts to burn down? The Osage Nation in Oklahoma. Yet another Cherokee citizen who can't help but be that good, Wilson writes Native characters - like all his characters - who feel so realistic, it's as if they've popped right out of Oklahoma and onto the page. To call this a page-turner is to minimize how brilliant this action-packed, tightly written, and incredibly smart (especially in terms of social commentary) this book is. And who blurbed this book? Stephen King. That's who.

The Road Back to Sweetgrass by Linda LeGarde Grover (University of Minnesota Press; out now)

Grover is a quietly revolutionary (and prolific) Anishinaabe writer. She beautifully and uncompromisingly weaves in Native language, and she also writes about darker aspects of Native history, such as the much-reviled boarding schools of the 19th and 20th century without cutting corners when it comes to story. Native boarding schools were nothing like Holden Caulfield's; they were places Native children were forced to go, where teachers stripped them of their traditional clothing, quite literally beat them when they spoke their languages, and often much, much worse happened. Sweetgrass takes us into the world of three different women, Dale Ann, Theresa, and Margie - all from the Mozhay Point Reservation, all of whom leave home for college or work, but are always drawn back.

Murder on the Red River by Marcie Rendon (Cinco Puntos Press; out now)

Part of the Anishinaabe writer Rendon's Cash Blackbear series, Murder on the Red River is a novel about sugar beet truck driver, pool hustler, and all-around cool AF bad girl Cash. While enmeshed in an affair with a married man she knows is going nowhere, and worried that her life, too, might be going nowhere, she realizes that she has a strong instinct and nearly preternatural ability when it comes to solving crimes. Funny, unflinching, and almost noir in tone, this book is a winner for those with a taste for classic detective fiction with a deeply modern flair.

Livingston has quietly produced a number of lovely but gut-wrenching books about being Creek and gay - and, boy, is the Native book world more than overdue for a queer writer with such talent. Owls is about Peter Strongbow, a young man who is just beginning to learn how to contend with his heritage and, even more heartbreakingly, the fact that the love of his life is living with HIV. Another prolific writer, and one who also writes poetry and nonfiction, Livingston has written a book that will get you good. Or, as Natives might say, goot.

Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse (Saga Press/Simon & Schuster; out now)

Roanhorse, a Pueblo author and the first and only Native American to win a Hugo Award, takes Diné stories to a new, vibrant level with her novel about Maggie Hoskie, a monster slayer whose skills are needed after the Big Water (read: climate change), when old gods come back to help, and hurt, the living. Her love, Neizgháni, who saved her from death, has abandoned her, but she must face him - and her own inner demons - on a quest to find out more about a witch behind a series of killings, all while trying to figure out if she can trust the man who has been sent along with her.

Sacred Smokes by Theodore C. Van Alst Jr. (University of New Mexico Press; out now)

Tommy Orange is the culture's go-to guy about the urban Indian landscape these days, but there are a number of urban Indian writers, like Van Alst, whose characters also live in cities. Set in Chicago, which has a surprisingly large Native population, in part because of government-supported relocation programs, these short stories focus on young people growing up with gangs, hanging out in clubs, and in general living sharp, difficult lives. Though driven more by language and character than plot, these stories will take you on a journey with their narrator, Teddy, his father, and friends, like Gooch, who is paralyzed from the waist down as a result of a gang shooting.

Cherokee America by Margaret Verble (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; out now)

Cherokee citizens are kicking butt and taking names in the fiction world, and Verble, a Pulitzer finalist, is no exception, with her sweeping historical drama set in Cherokee territory before the removal (google: Trail of Tears). Check, in many ways the central character, has a fascinating personal history: Her father is both a slave owner and a well-known soldier; her husband is an abolitionist. Check determines to solve, and avenge, a series of crimes all while history marches forward, threatening to tear her nation - and her family, apart. Refreshingly honest about slave ownership in Cherokee territory, this novel takes us through the Civil War and shows us the consequences that this part of American history has had on a people - and their right to self-determination.

There There by Tommy Orange (Knopf; out now)

With an introduction and interlude that speak to Native American history in this country in beautiful lyric essay form and a culminating shootout at a powwow in Oakland, it's clear why Orange's novel delivered a one-two punch in the literary landscape. The novel features 12 Native characters. Some of them have intertwined histories that meet in the past, with the Native American occupation of Alcatraz, and some of them only have Oakland, and a tragic outcome, in common.

Shortlisted for the 2018 National Book Awards, this searing novel by Hobson, about a Cherokee teenager caught in the social work system after his mother ends up in prison, will linger in your mind. Sequoyah is a troubled, quiet kid who ends up in the home of a well-meaning but largely naive white couple. When he meets Rosemary - also Native (Ponca), he can't figure out whether he loves her or wants to be her, culminating in the kind of climax that leaves you breathless.

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones (Saga Press/Simon & Schuster; May 19)

Jones, the prolific Blackfeet master of horror and winner of a Bram Stoker Award, wants to scare you good, if you like that kind of thing. Trigger warning: There is gore. But the blood is in service of a greater good: a story about four young men who go hunting somewhere reserved only for elders - for good reason, it turns out. That ground has power, and when they hunt one particular elk down, the animal bides its time until it can hunt them back. Subtly funny and wry at turns, this novel will give you nightmares. The good kind, of course.

Crooked Hallelujah by Kelli Jo Ford (Grove Atlantic; July 14)

Ford's Crooked Hallelujah is more than just a really great title; it's the book that's going to be taught in creative writing programs for decades to come. Centering on teenage Justine, but covering three generations of Cherokee women, this novel-in-stories follows Justine's life in Oklahoma, as she deals with being abandoned by her father and the toughness, and tenderness, of her mother and grandmother. And finally, an act of violence that changes everything. What else can you say about a writer who won the prestigious Plimpton Prize and was published in the Paris Review right out of the gate? Nothing beyond "Take my money."

Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden (Ecco/HarperCollins; Aug. 25)

This literary crime novel by a Sicangu Lakota author is about Virgil the vigilante, who waives his fees when he's been assigned people who sexually abuse children. Groundbreaking in its scope and gritty-pretty when it comes to language, this visceral page-turner will have you rooting for Virgil as he chases down the drug dealers causing so much pain on the Rosebud Reservation. He's joined by his ex, Marie, as they venture down into Denver, and back up to the rez again, only to uncover secrets that have the power to destroy them both. ●

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14 Contemporary Books By Native American Writers To Get Excited About

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This set of stories is one of the few - by a Native author or by any author - that seems to be able to pull off that cool-kid experimental thing and make it seem sharp and compelling. There are some great stories in the collection by Métis author Jensen, but my personal favorite is the title story.

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Bowwow Powwow by Benda J. Child -- Read Aloud - YouTube

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Bowwow Powwow by Benda J. Child -- Read Aloud