Samantha is a Navajo girl attending Atsá Mesa Community School on the Navajo Reservation. Her life has seemed pretty average when one day at school her body suddenly changes. As a ́Diné, Samantha must now prepare for the Diné womanhood ceremony called the Kinaaldá, a ceremony once performed by the Navajo deity, Changing Woman. With her life now filled with more drama than ever before, she’s reluctant to participate in the demanding four-day ceremony. With a whirlwind of new adventures and pep talks from those closest to her, Sam’s family and her two best friends do their best to help Sam deal with bullies, boys, and her new responsibilities as a Diné woman.
Navajo
Alice Yazzie’s Year
Twelve free verse poems chronicle the events and feelings of a Navajo girl’s eleventh year.
Who Wants To Be A Prairie Dog? (Navajo Fairy Tales)
A young Navajo boy must participate in his family’s annual sheep dip. As he follows the sheep to the dipping site, he is led on an adventure and must choose what is more important: his needs or the needs of others.
Yossel’s Journey
Yossel, along with his family, flees anti-Jewish Russian pogroms in the late nineteenth century and settles in the American Southwest where he forges a friendship with Thomas, a Native American Navajo boy.
When We Are Kind / [Oxia Script]
When We Are Kind celebrates simple acts of everyday kindness and encourages children to explore how they feel when they initiate and receive acts of kindness in their lives. Celebrated author Monique Gray Smith has written many books on the topics of resilience and reconciliation and communicates an important message through carefully chosen words for readers of all ages. Beautifully illustrated by artist Nicole Neidhardt, this book encourages children to be kind to others and to themselves.
Code Word Courage
In September 1944 eleven-year-old Billie lives with her great aunt, Doff, eagerly waiting for her older brother Leo to return from boot camp, and desperate to find the father that left when she was little; but Leo brings a friend with him, a Navajo named Denny, and the injured dog they have rescued and named Bear–and when the two young men go off to war Bear becomes the thread that ties them all together, and helps Billie to find a true friend.
First Laugh
A Navajo family welcomes a new baby into the family with love and ceremony, eagerly waiting for that first special laugh. Includes brief description of birth customs in different cultures.
Frog Brings Rain
As fire creeps toward the village of the First People, First Man and First Woman must find a way to quench the flames. First Woman asks the Bird People, the River People, and the Water People for assistance, but everyone she speaks to has an excuse. “Not me,” said Mockingbird. “The smoke would hurt my voice and I would never sing again.” “Not me,” said Snail. “I carry my house with me and I am slow.” “No,” said Beaver. “We’d like to help, but our river home would become a desert if we changed the flow of water.” At last, First Woman asks the mysterious Frog for help. Will he be able to stop the flames before they reach the village? Author Patricia Hruby Powell’s retelling of this Navajo folktale is as graceful as it is compelling, and as magical as the mythical time it describes.
Fall In Line, Holden
At a very strict school in Indigenous Nation, everyone but Holden stays in line until they reach the door at the end of the school day.
The Precious Gift: A Navaho Creation Myth
A drop of fresh water must be retrieved in order for First Man to create a stream or lake in his parched homeland, and the members of his village are unable to do so, but, through an unexpected twist of fate, their doomed destiny may be saved.