64 books like Border Songs

"There’s no there there." -Gertrude Stein

This book centers around the plight of twelve young, urban Native Americans in Oakland, California, who, having lost connection to the land and their heritage, struggle to make sense of their identity. For various reasons, they all travel to and converge at the Big Oakland Powwow.

It is a gut-wrenching story that grapples with the disenfranchisement of Native Americans, starting with the colonies; the novel opens with a true account of the so-called Indian Wars. An account of history that was rewritten to make us feel good about Thanksgiving. I loved it for the opening scene and the historical references. An impossible to put down novel.

Imagine waking up one morning to find brown, evil-smelling water flowing from your taps. This is what happened in Flint, Michigan, one morning in 2014. Some people blamed the residents of Flint for the debacle, but the city manager made the arbitrary decision to tap into the Flint River to save money. It's ironic that within a week, GM hooked themselves back up to the Detroit waterline as the untreated water was ruining their equipment. 

The story follows two families through generations, converging in the present. I found the flashback to the sit-down strike in 1936 at GM in Flint (Chevy in the Hole) especially interesting. It was the beginning of a strong UAW. 

The main characters, who are determined to coax life back into a city everyone else has given up on, are flawed, thus likeable and real. Gus, newly committed to sobriety, and Monae, an urban farmer, seem… show more.

I loved this book because it made me cry with its emotional impact. It opened my eyes to the mistreatment of Native Americans and the Spanish/Mexican inhabitants of southern California when the territory was annexed by the United States after the Spanish-American War. 

This is the love story between the mixed-race orphan girl, Ramona, and Alessandro, the head of the Native American sheep shearers. When they fall in love, knowing her aunt, who took her in and owns the rancho, will never let her marry a Native American, they elope. But Alessandro’s tribe is soon driven off their land by American settlers flooding the area, and he and Ramona are thrown into poverty as they travel from locale to locale, desperately trying to find a place to call home. 

This book is the story of four teenagers desperate to escape the mining towns of Ishpeming and Negaunee but doomed to immersion in the violence simmering just beneath the surface.

Riekki did a good job of instilling a sense of impending doom from the opening pages, and I couldn’t put it down. It showed me a side of the UP I didn’t know existed, one beyond the beauty of the peninsula, shining a light on the dirty underbelly of mining—what it offers and what it leaves behind—the cavings—underground passages left by the mining company. Riekki’s description of the bottomless pit in the woods is Poe creepy.

Physically and emotionally brutalized, these four characters—angst-filled Craig; J., never touched by a woman; Antony, with the walls he puts up; and Hollow, determined to escape, are a downtrodden, culturally isolated group. I rooted for them and recognized them as characters that can be… show more.

Three kick-ass half-fae, orphaned sisters, all with their own magical abilities they’re still learning to control while protecting the mortal world from demons? Oh, and a steamy-as-hell romance? This book was super fun to read from the very first page to the last.

I loved the humor, much of it being self-deprecating, and the relatable lack of confidence Camille had in her powers. It was a ride that I wasn’t expecting, and it became a gateway drug to read the rest of the books in this series. And what a series! 

What do you do when you have seven brothers, are the only girl for miles, and are being told you need to act like a proper lady? You say no. May Amelia does not want to be harnessed like a darn mule. The Washington wilderness of 1899 lays before her in all its glory. Her brothers are off exploring. Why can’t she too? And if that means breaking a few rules, well May Amelia Jackson is just the girl to do it. May Amelia’s tenacity and bravery made me want to stand up and cheer. She is my kind of girl—one who has the will and the determination to make a life lived on her terms.

This book is about twin Israeli-American teenage girls whose mom has Huntington’s disease and the different ways they go about handling that as individuals and how it affects the sister’s relationship. I love the way religion is handled in this book, with each sister’s different take where it concerns their Judaism. It’s about life, death, and sisterhood. I loved it. 

I’m not a climber, but I thoroughly enjoyed this classic book about mountaineering at Mount Rainier National Park. The author covers it all—geology, weather, routes, equipment, accidents, rescues, and guides. As a history geek, I appreciated the detailed descriptions of some of the earliest climbs, including ones before 1900. The book was originally released in 1971, but the newest edition includes updated information. 

I fell in love with the characters. Even the ones I didn’t necessarily like, I wanted to read more about.

More importantly, for me, this book came out at a time when I was having difficulties in my own relationship. The idea of being apart from the one person I thought would be forever shattered me. Reading Bella’s emotions for Edward and the crushing heartbreak she felt, was like reading about my feelings on the pages of the book.

Of course there’s vampires and I love all things vampire.

This book explores the history of two communities that during the Cold War devoted themselves to the production of nuclear weapons: Richland, Washington and Ozersk in Russia’s southern Urals. She calls this a “tandem history” because even though the towns existed in very different countries, the U.S. and the USSR, seeing them side-by-side reveals how much they had in common as a result of nuclear secrecy, accidents, and the privileges that came with working inside the jewel in the crown of a military-industrial complex. Brown is a skilled author and she inserts herself into her stories with travelogue segments that in the hands of a lesser writer might seem self-indulgent but in hers add texture to the historical fabric.