Teen Picks for Native American and Indigenous Peoples Heritage Month

Derrick, a Navajo boy who lives on a reservation in New Mexico, is excited to earn a scholarship to a prestigious boarding school on the East Coast. When his grandmother grows ill, he realizes that her fear of boarding schools grows out of her own time spent in a federal Native boarding school.

It is 1990. Morgan has lived all her life in the small fishing town of Prince Rupert in northern British Columbia. Ever since her mom took off when she was ten, Morgan has kept an eye on her dad, a commercial fisherman who works hard and occasionally parties even harder. After struggling to keep up and find a place at a public high school, Morgan’s best friend Skye convinces her to attend an alternate school.

Set at a classic drive-in restaurant that seems to exist in every Native community, this anthology unites the stories of teens from all kinds of backgrounds through the shared theme of Native joy, with stories and poems reflecting hope, healing, humor, love, friendship, romance, and joy.

A year after her brother Ally’s death was ruled suicide by overdose, Andy starts university without her “honorary twin,” writing him letters as she strives to embrace her bisexuality and her Indigenous identity.

Shane works with her mother and their ghost dogs, tracking down missing persons even when their families can’t afford to pay. Their own family was displaced from their traditional home years ago following a devastating flood and the loss of Shane’s father and her grandparents.

After inadvertently starting rumors of a haunted cemetery, a teen who lives with her widowed father befriends a ghost in this young adult novel exploring grief and belonging.

In this heartfelt and often-funny memoir, author Sonya Ballantyne gives us a look at her younger self’s diary and inner life as she struggles to find herself in the pop culture she loves. Before she was a successful writer, Sonya Ballantyne was just another kid growing up on the rez, searching for her place in the world.

This middle-grade nonfiction book tells the riveting story of the 1969 takeover of Alcatraz by a group of 89 Native Americans, which inspired a whole generation of Native activists and ignited the modern American Indian Movement.

Recounts the history of Indigenous children forcibly sent to boarding schools by the United States government in order to erase their culture. Focusing on Little Moon There Are No Stars Tonight’s story, who was only four years old when she was removed from her home and sent to Chilocco, her grandson tells her and his own story of the institution’s lasting effect.

Killing the Wittigo explains the traumatic effects of colonization on young Indigenous people. It includes reflection questions and activities in each chapter to encourage mindfulness and emotional regulation, help build reader self-awareness about wellness and self-care, and what it will take to stop the cycle of intergenerational trauma.