What do marauding vampires, teen restaurant impresarios, small town politics and grieving families have in common? Cynthia Leitich Smith, writer and scholar extraordinaire. Carey and Marie talk about the inescapable legacy of Twilight, Native American kidlit and YA, photography as a catalyst for self-exploration and expression, and really terrible men who dress like they did a walk of shame from a Hot Topic. 

Rain is Not My Indian Name: Goodreads

Tantalize: Goodreads

Cynthia Leitich Smith: Website

Content Warnings

Rain is Not My Indian Name

Racism, small town prejudice, anti-Native prejudice, grief (long term and short term), girl on girl relational agression

Tantalize

Gore, physical violence, vampirism, sexualization of teenagers, drugging and forcibly turning a teenager into a vampire. Also the baby squirrel thing.

Show Notes

Rain is Not My Indian Name readers' guide

Cynsations Blog: The Tantalize Series

11 Most Haunted Places in Austin

Austin Book Store: Book People

Nowadays, Cassidy can attend one of these programs: These Revolutionary Programs Are Helping Native American Kids Chase Careers In Science, Technology, And Engineering

A real life Aunt Georgia: Czarina Salido fighting to help young Native American girls discover STEM

10 STEM Summer Camps for Students of Color

Native Now: Contemporary Indian Stories: article by  by Cynthia Leitich Smith (contemporary to Rain is Not My Indian Name)

A real-life Sanguini's in Tokyo, Japan

Weekend Update: Pete Davidson on Staten Island

Readalikes

Sunshine by Robin McKinley

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

Current Reads

My Lady Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, Jodi Meadows

The Mindful Child by Susan K Greenland

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. (CC Marie Macula, Carey Farrell 2017)