Selection: The Dance Boots

Our March selection for the KOJB Book Club is The Dance Boots, a collection of short stories by Linda LeGarde Grover, published by the University of Georgia Press. The Dance Boots earned the University of Georgia’s 2009 Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction. Dr. Grover is an Anishinaabe ikwe from Bois Forte, an American Indian Studies professor at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, and a regular columnist for the Duluth Budgeteer News.

The Dance Boots is an engrossing, heartfelt collection of related stories about a family from the fictional Mozhay Point Reservation situated in northeastern Minnesota, and the stories delve into different characters, their histories and perspectives. Dr. Grover has an eye for rich descriptive details, an ear for the music of language (both Anishinaabemowin and English), and a way of subtly teaching about the far-reaching, immense impact of United States’ assimilation policies on American Indian individuals and families. In the same way Dr. Grover captures the personal and societal tragedies that are all too common in reservation communities, she also captures the joy, the pride, the strength, the effervescent humor, the persistence, the survival, and the sheer beauty of Anishinaabeg. The aunties and uncles, cousins, brothers and sisters, friends and relatives who populate these stories will feel very much like beloved family to readers.

The Dance Boots, by Linda LeGarde Grover, is available in hardcover and will be available in paperback beginning April 2012 and can be purchased online through the publisher University of Georgia Press, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book World, or can be checked out freely through the Kitchigami Regional Library System.

Interview: The Night Wanderer – Drew Hayden Taylor

Last week, this very nervous and starstruck interviewer had the pleasure of talking to Drew Hayden Taylor — the very smart, very funny, very charming author of The Night Wanderer: A Native Gothic Novel, the KOJB Book Club selection for February. Drew Taylor is an Ojibway man from Curve Lake First Nation and is an extraordinarily prolific writer, having written a number of critically-acclaimed plays and essays.  His first novel, The Night Wanderer, is story of a teenage girl named Tiffany Hunter living in the fictional Otter Lake Reserve; her family takes in a boarder from Europe who happens to be an Anishinaabe vampire returning to his homeland. It’s a great story for any young adult, especially teens going through tough times or feeling like they’re trapped, and even not-so-young adults!

The Night Wanderer is published in paperback by Annick Press and is available for purchase through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book World, and Target.

Listen to our KOJB Book Club interview with the delightful Drew Taylor here: 2012-02 Taylor Night Wanderer

BONUS! Drew Taylor’s play, Raven Stole the Sun, is coming to Minnesota. New Native Theatre presents Toronto’s Red Sky Performance‘s touring production of Raven Stole the Sun with performances March 23-25, 2012, at the Stepping Stone Theatre in St. Paul. Tickets are $7 each, and the show is for families and people of all ages. Learn more at New Native Theatre’s Raven Stole the Sun webpage. To purchase tickets online, please visit this link.

And if you’re looking for more vampire tales to satisfy your bloodlust booklust:

• Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897) – Considered the classic of vampire novels and written in an epistolic format (journals and letters relate the events of the story), this is the book people tend to think of when they think vampires. The book holds up very well over time, even if some might consider it pretty “tame” by today’s standards. The reading style is a little more demanding than most contemporary popular literature but well worth any extra effort!
• Stephen King‘s ‘Salem’s Lot (1975) – Stephen King took his turn spinning a vampire yarn, and the book is a pop culture classic. Written for adults but usually well-received by teens who are moving beyond the typical aimed-at-YA (young adult, for those not hip with the youths) books.
• Anne Rice‘s Vampire Chronicles series – The series is largely credited for “bringing sexy back” to vampires and spawned two popular movies, Interview with a Vampire (1994) and Queen of the Damned (2002). Might not be appropriate for all readers (anyone squeamish with R-rated sex and violence) but a much-beloved series by many vampire aficionados.

1. Interview with the Vampire (1976)
2. The Vampire Lestat (1985)
3. The Queen of the Damned (1988)
4. The Tale of the Body Thief (1992)
5. Memnoch the Devil (1995)
6. The Vampire Armand (1998)
7. Merrick (2000)
8. Blood and Gold (2001)
9. Blackwood Farm (2002)
10. Blood Canticle (2003)

• Laurell K. Hamilton‘s Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series – A fun, fast-paced, super-steamy supernatural series – darker than Southern Vampire Mysteries, lighter than Vampire Chronicles. Might not be appropriate for most teens or sensitive or socially-conservative readers (think R+ as a rating for sex and violence, if such a category existed).

1. Guilty Pleasures (1993)
2. The Laughing Corpse (1994)
3. Circus of the Damned (1995)
4. The Lunatic Cafe (1996)
5. Bloody Bones (1996)
6. The Killing Dance (1997)
7. Burnt Offerings (1998)
8. Blue Moon (1998)
9. Obsidian Butterfly (2000)
10. Narcissus in Chains (2001)
11. Cerulean Sins (2003)
12. Incubus Dreams (2004)
13. Micah (2006)
14. Danse Macabre (2006)
15. The Harlequin (2007)
16. Blood Noir (2008)
17. Skin Trade (2009)
18. Flirt (2010)
19. Bullet (2010)
20. Hit List (2011)
21. Kiss the Dead (2012)

• Charlaine Harris‘ Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse series – Basis for the HBO television series True Blood, these books are fun, quick reads that are superficially lighthearted in spots and darkly satirical in others. Aimed more at the twentysomething-plus set, the books will still find avid fans in mature teens. The main character Sookie Stackhouse is a remarkably sympathetic character for anyone who has ever felt like an outsider.

1. Dead Until Dark (2001)
2. Living Dead in Dallas (2002)
3. Club Dead (2003)
4. Dead to the World (2004)
5. Dead as a Doornail (2005)
6. Definitely Dead (2006)
7. All Together Dead (2007)
8. From Dead to Worse (2008)
9. Dead and Gone (2009)
10. Dead in the Family (2010)
11. Dead Reckoning (2011)
12. Deadlocked (2012)

• Stephenie Meyer‘s Twilight series - Lots of people from teens to “twi-moms” are smitten with this supernatural soap opera of a series which has been made into a series of equally-popular movies.

1. Twilight (2005)
2. New Moon (2006)
3. Eclipse (2007)
4. Breaking Dawn (2008)

• Cynthia Leitich Smith‘s Tantalize series – Aimed at teens but likely to appeal more broadly, this set of books creates a dark, rich fantasy twist on a realistic world, much in the vein of the Southern Vampire Mysteries but more appropriate for younger readers. Cool fact: the author is a Muscogee Creek Nation citizen.

1. Tantalize (2007)
2. Eternal (2009)
3. Blessed (2011)
4. Diabolical (2012)

Did we miss any vampire novels you love? Have a supernatural series you are dying to share (wordplay intended)? Or do you just want to go all fangirl/fanboy overThe Night Wanderer by the fantastic Mr. Drew Hayden Taylor? Share your thoughts with us in the comments section.

Please note: comments are moderated for spam-protection (comments are only for humans and vampires who aren’t selling anything, please). Submitted comments may not appear immediately or may be delayed until a human or undead moderator has access to them.

Preview: The Night Wanderer

Next week, I get to talk with Drew Hayden Taylor about his book, The Night Wanderer: A Native Gothic Novel, which is a fantastic tale about a teenage girl living on fictional Otter Lake Reserve, a vampire returning to his home, and what it means to be alive. The Night Wanderer isn’t just a book for young adults; this is a great story for anyone who knows and empathizes with the challenges and pressures teenagers face. (A warning for easily-spooked readers: such a good story but may induce nightmares about the undead and incite overactive imaginations to believe that bathrobes hanging on door hooks might be lurking vampires.)

The KOJB Book Club airs on the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month at 11:00 a.m. on KOJB 90.1 FM The Eagle, broadcasting live across the Leech Lake Reservation and streaming online at http://www.kojib.org.

2012-02 Promo Taylor Night Wanderer

Selection: The Night Wanderer

The February 2012 selection for our KOJB Book Club is The Night Wanderer: A Native Gothic Novel by prolific Canadian writer Drew Hayden Taylor from Curve Lake First Nation.  The novel is about Tiffany Hunter, a teenage girl from the fictional Otter Lake First Nation who is inundated with problems including her mother having left the family, arguments with her father, and relationship problems with her boyfriend. And then along comes a centuries-old vampire returning to his homeland…

The Night Wanderer will appeal to fans of supernaturally-themed books like the Twilight series and the Sookie Stackhouse series, on which the HBO series True Blood is based; Taylor puts a smart and sharp Anishinaabe spin on the traditional European vampire lore.  However, more than just a good spooky story, The Night Wanderer is a fantastic book about the challenges young adults — and, indeed, many of us of all ages and backgrounds – face and about the choices to live and to die.

The Night Wanderer is published by Annick Press and is available in hardcover (list price $21.95) and paperback (list price $10.95) through Annick Press, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, and Book World.

Read more about Drew Hayden Taylor and The Night Wanderer: A Native Gothic Novel:

• Drew Hayden Taylor’s official website – http://www.drewhaydentaylor.com
• Annick Press’s official The Night Wanderer page – http://site.annickpress.com/catalog/catalog.aspx?Title=Night+Wanderer,+The
• July 2007 Quill & Quire review of The Night Wanderer – http://www.quillandquire.com/books_young/review.cfm?review_id=5638
• October 2007 CM Magazine review of The Night Wanderer – http://www.umanitoba.ca/outreach/cm/vol14/no4/thenightwanderer.html
• November 2008 interview with writer Cynthia Leitich Smith on The Night Wanderer – http://cynthialeitichsmith.blogspot.com/2008/11/author-interview-drew-hayden-taylor-on.html
• October 2010 interview with YA Bookshelf blogger Melissa Montovani on The Night Wanderer - http://www.yabookshelf.com/2010/10/interview-with-drew-hayden-taylor-author-of-the-night-wanderer/

Watch and learn:

• Annick Press’s video book trailer – http://youtu.be/KOJbAd2c5WA

• Drew Hayden Taylor’s The Night Wanderer reading from the November 2009 Words Aloud 6 Spoken Word Festival in Durham, Ontario - http://youtu.be/xpSo1H81c04

Program Day & Time Change!

Beginning February 2012, the KOJB Book Club will air at 11:00 a.m. on the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month on KOJB 90.1 FM The Eagle across the Leech Lake Reservation and streaming online at http://www.kojb.org.

Interview: Apprenticed to Justice – Kimberly Blaeser

Our selection for the January 2012 installment of the KOJB Book Club is Apprenticed to Justice by University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee English professor, nature photographer, and poet Dr. Kimberly Blaeser; the book of poetry is published by Salt Publishing and is available in paperback (list price $15.95).

Dr. Blaeser’s poetry connects strongly to her Anishinaabe and German family heritage and stories, to memories embedded in land and culture, to the natural world, to motherhood.  Her poetry is filled with rich imagery, intimate details, and profound observations. In our interview, she talks about the craft of poetry, shares her inspiration, and reads several of her stunning poems.

Listen to our interview here: 2012-01 Blaeser Apprenticed to Justice

Learn more about Dr. Kimberly Blaeser and Apprenticed to Justice:

• Dr. Kimberly Blaeser’s official site on Storytellers: Native American Authors Online
• Dr. Blaeser’s University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee faculty page
• Salt Publishing’s Apprenticed to Justice page

Preview: Apprenticed to Justice

Remember to mark your calendar to listen to Dr. Kimberly Blaeser speak about her book of poetry, Apprenticed to Justice, on Thursday, January 19, 2012, at 10:30 a.m. on KOJB 90.1 FM The Eagle, streaming live at KOJB.org.

2012-12-19 Promo