Race to the Sun, by Rebecca Roanhorse

[mrissa]

Review copy provided by the publisher.

If you've been following the new releases from the Rick Riordan Presents imprint of kids' fantasies, I think you'll be pleased with Rebecca Roanhorse's addition to the line, a tale of modern Navajo (Diné) kids fighting exploitative monsters on behalf of the world. If you've been reading Rebecca Roanhorse's science fiction fantasy thrillers set in a ravaged American Southwest, I think it'll be exciting to see her do a kids' take on the same region and legends. If you haven't been reading either--welcome, you've got a lot of fun stuff ahead of you.

And this is one.

Nizhoni Begay has never quite figured out how she's going to shine in the world, but she's sure there's going to be something. She's in the midst of crossing basketball and internet stardom off her list, but surely something else will come along where she can dazzle. It turns out there is! And it is monsters! Or the hunting of monsters! So that's...well, it's a lot, honestly. It is a whole book worth and possibly then some. Nizhoni's little brother and best friend have special gifts of their own, not just along for the ride, and so do some unexpected other cast members, sometimes in disguise.

So this is a heck of a quest. Trains and giant birds and personal growth and magical arrows and things that you would want on a quest! It is fun and it has brave kid protagonists and they eat Cheetos and fight baddies and basically I think you will like it and also some kids you know might like it! Okay? Okay!

Comments

[themagdalen]

Okay!

[thanate]

Oh, lovely! I wanted to be excited about her adult books, & then they hit too many urban fantasy tropes I'm kind of burned out on, and I was very sad.

[oracne]

That sounds terrific!

[sartorias]

Oh this sounds like fun!

[ethelmay]

https://navajotimes.com/opinion/essay/guest-column-new-novel-twists-dine-teachings-spirituality/ raises some concerns. Debbie Rese (of the American Indians in Children's Literature blog) wrote on Facebook:
"I do not recommend Rebecca Roanhorse's RACE TO THE SUN.

"I've read it and it is similar to TRAIL OF LIGHTNING which the Diné Writers Collective strongly objected to for her appropriation and mis-use of Diné culture and spirituality.

"Roanhorse is not Diné and though she says she is from Ohkay Owingeh, she is not connected there and is not enrolled."

[mrissa]

Thanks for sharing Rese's concerns. The link is to a review of a different book, and the introduction to RACE TO THE SUN talks about Roanhorse's family connections to various characters' heritage so readers (or in this case parents, teachers, librarians as well) know up front which characters might represent her own experience and which do not, and can judge with that information and this.

[mrissa]

I wanted to add that I saw today that one of Reese's objections to Roanhorse is that her Pueblo mother put her up for adoption and they did not reconnect until Roanhorse was an adult. That is the basis for "though she says she is from Ohkay Owingeh, she is not connected there and is not enrolled": that Roanhorse was an adopted child who had to work to regain connection with her biofamily, which she did do.

I feel that many people, including myself, will raise eyebrows at that as a basis for objecting to someone's connection to their ethnicity, and it gives a context for Reese's remarks that is rather different from "who knows what this person's background even is." We do know. It's just not "Pueblo enough" for Debbie Reese because Rebecca Roanhorse didn't grow up with her birth mother.

As someone who has family members who joined my family by adoption AND family members we had to reconnect with in adulthood because they were adopted out as infants, I have extremely strong emotional reactions to that, and this blog is probably not the place to put more of Debbie Reese's comments about Rebecca Roanhorse because of that context.