Books by Indigenous Authors (Nonfiction)

Updated July 3, 2025
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Braiding sweetgrass
Kimmerer, Robin Wall
Other
A New York Times Bestseller A Washington Post Bestseller Named a "Best Essay Collection of the Decade" by Literary Hub As a botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer has been trained to ask questions of nature with the tools of science. As a member...
Heart berries : a memoir
Mailhot, Terese Marie
Paper Book
*A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER & EDITORS' CHOICE* Winner of the Spalding Prize for the Promotion of Peace and Justice in Literature Finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award for English-Language Nonfiction Selected by Emma Watson as the Our Shared Shelf Book Club Pick for...
The serviceberry : abundance and reciprocity in the natural world
Kimmerer, Robin Wall
Paper Book
An Instant New York Times Bestseller From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Braiding Sweetgrass, a bold and inspiring vision for how to orient our lives around gratitude, reciprocity, and community, based on the lessons of the natural world....

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We had a little real estate problem : the unheralded story of Native Americans in comedy
Nesteroff, Kliph
Paper Book
A Best Book of 2021 by NPR and Esquire From Kliph Nesteroff, "the human encyclopedia of comedy" (VICE), comes the important and underappreciated story of Native Americans and comedy. It was one of the most reliable jokes in Charlie Hill's...
When the light of the world was subdued, our songs came through : a Norton anthology of Native nations poetry
Harjo, Joy
Paper Book
United States Poet Laureate Joy Harjo gathers the work of more than 160 poets, representing nearly 100 indigenous nations, into one momentous volume. This landmark anthology celebrates the indigenous peoples of North America, the first poets of this country, whose literary traditions stretch back...
Weaving sundown in a scarlet light : fifty poems for fifty years
Harjo, Joy
Paper Book
A magnificent selection of fifty poems to celebrate three-term US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo's fifty years as a poet. Over a long, influential career in poetry, Joy Harjo has been praised for her "warm, oracular voice" (John Freeman, Boston Globe) that speaks "from a deep and...
The rediscovery of America : native peoples and the unmaking of U.S. history
Blackhawk, Ned
Paper Book
National Bestseller Winner of the 2023 National Book Award in Nonfiction * Finalist for the 2023 Los Angeles Times Book Award in History * Winner of 2024 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in Nonfiction * Winner of the 2024 Mark Lynton History Prize ...

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The heartbeat of Wounded Knee : native America from 1890 to the present
Treuer, David
Paper Book
Beginning with the tribes' devastating loss of land and the forced assimilation of their children at government-run boarding schools, he shows how the period of greatest adversity also helped to incubate a unifying Native identity. He traces how conscription in the US military and the pull of urban...
Project 562 : changing the way we see Native America
Wilbur, Matika
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER . A photographic and narrative celebration of contemporary Native American life and cultures, alongside an in-depth examination of issues that Native people face, by celebrated photographer and storyteller Matika Wilbur of the Swinomish and Tulalip Tribes. ...

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Dog flowers : a memoir
Geller, Danielle
Paper Book
A daughter returns home to the Navajo reservation to retrace her mother's life in a memoir that is both a narrative and an archive of one family's troubled history.   "A candid and achingly fractured memoir of [Geller's] mother, her family, her Navajo heritage and her own...
Whiskey tender : a memoir
Taffa, Deborah Jackson
Paper Book
Finalist for the National Book Award Longlisted for a Carnegie Medal for Excellence Winner of the Southwest Book Award A Best Book of the Year: Washington Post, Esquire, Time, The Atlantic, NPR, and Publishers Weekly An Oprah Daily "Best New Book" and "Riveting...

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A mind spread out on the ground
Elliott, Alicia
Paper Book
In her raw, unflinching memoir . . . she tells the impassioned, wrenching story of the mental health crisis within her own family and community . . . A searing cry. --New York Times Book Review The Mohawk phrase for depression can be roughly translated to a mind spread out on the...
The cost of free land : Jews, Lakota, and an American inheritance
Clarren, Rebecca
Paper Book
Winner of the Frances Fuller Victor Award for General Nonfiction Winner of the Will Rogers Medallion Award for Western Nonfiction Finalist for The Stubbendieck Great Plains Distinguished Book Prize Shortlisted for The William Saroyan International Prize A Kirkus Reviews...

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By the fire we carry : the generations-long fight for justice on native land
Nagle, Rebecca
Paper Book
"No part of the judiciary exposes the chasm between American ideals and institutional practice like federal Indian law. In By the Fire We Carry, Nagle, a Cherokee journalist, turns a case most Americans haven't heard of into a legal thriller." --New York Times Book Review NATIONAL...

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The Indian card : who gets to be native in America
Schuettpelz, Carrie Lowry
Paper Book
A groundbreaking and deeply personal exploration of Tribal enrollment, and what it means to be Native American in the United States "A genre-bending work of reportage, memoir, and history" --The New Yorker "Candid, unflinching . . . Her thorough...

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We will be jaguars : a memoir of my people
Nenquimo, Nemonte
Paper Book
REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK Named one of the Best Nonfiction Books of the Year by Library Journal "An unforgettable memoir about fighting for your home and your heart." --Reese Witherspoon (Reese's Book Club November '24 Pick) ...

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