One Book | One Minnesota
Minnesota, let's read together.
One Book | One Minnesota is a statewide book club that invites Minnesotans of all ages to read a common title and come together virtually to enjoy, reflect, and discuss.
Libraries are essential for connection, and through One Book | One Minnesota, libraries across the state will connect their communities through stories and bring Minnesotans closer together.
The spring reading period is happening now through May 3. Scroll down for more information.
Sign up for our e-newsletter here to get program updates.
One Book Chapter 15 | Spring 2026
The featured title is What Lolo Wants by Cristina Oxtra.
Free eBook Access
Click here to access the eBook of What Lolo Wants from March 9 - May 3.
Virtual Author Conversation
Wednesday, April 29 | 10:00 a.m.
Conversation with Cristina Oxtra
Free and open to the public | Registration required
One Book | One Minnesota is presented by The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library, as the Minnesota Center for the Book, in partnership with State Library Services and sponsored by Blaze Credit Union. Program partners also include AmazeWorks, Council of Regional Public Library System Administrators; Kids Can Press; Mackin VIA; Minitex; and the Minnesota Department of Education. This program is made possible in part through an appropriation from the Minnesota State Legislature to The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library as the Minnesota Center for the Book. The program is also funded in part by a grant from the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources Midwest Region program, managed by Illinois State University. Content created and featured in partnership with the TPS program does not indicate an endorsement by the Library of Congress.
Resources for Libraries
If you're a participant looking for information on book club events, please check your local library's website. Resources for the current and previous book selections are available below.
One Book Chapter 15: What Lolo Wants by Cristina Oxtra
Download the What Lolo Wants Reading and Discussion Guide.
One Book Chapter 14: Evidence of V: a Novel in Fragments, Facts, and Fictions by Sheila O'Connor
Download the Evidence of V Reading Guide
One Book Chapter 13: Where We Come From by Diane Wilson, Sun Yung Shin, Shannon Gibney & John Coy
Download the full Where We Come From Discussion Guide with ABE and SEL Standards
Download the Discussion Guide only.
Download the ABE and SEL Standards only
One Book Chapter 12: Sharks in the Time of Saviors by Kawai Strong Washburn
Download the Sharks in the Time of Saviors Discussion Guide
One Book Chapter 11: In the Night of Memory by Linda LeGarde Grover
Download the In the Night of Memory Discussion Guide.
One Book Ninth Chapter: We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World edited by Carolyn Holbrook and David Mura
Download We Are Meant to Rise Discussion Guide.
One Book Eighth Chapter: Iron Lake by William Kent Krueger
Download Iron Lake Discussion Guide.
One Book Seventh Chapter: The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse by Brian Farrey
Download The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse Discussion Guide.
One Book Sixth Chapter: The Song Poet by Kao Kalia Yang
Download The Song Poet Discussion Guide.
One Book Fifth Chapter: Murder on the Red River by Marcie Rendon
Download Murder on the Red River Discussion Guide.
One Book Fourth Chapter: Slider by Pete Hautman
Download Slider Discussion Guide.
One Book Third Chapter: The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
Fall 2020
Download The Plague of Doves discussion guide.
Download the list of complementary book titles for kids and young adults.
One Book Second Chapter: A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota
Summer 2020
Download Good Time for the Truth Discussion Guide
Additional Resources:
Reading for Racial Justice - Additional titles available from Minnesota Historical Society Press
Resources on Race - Saint Paul Public Library's list of relevant titles
Storytime at Saint Paul Public Library acknowledging George Floyd
One Book First Chapter: Because of Winn-Dixie
Spring 2020
Download Winn-Dixie Discussion Guide
Download Winn-Dixie Teachers Guide
One Book | One Minnesota
Book Availability
Chapter 15 book resources:
Ebooks Minnesota - The eBook is available through May 3, 2026.
Program Overview
One Book | One Minnesota is a statewide book club that invites Minnesotans of all ages to read a common title and come together virtually to enjoy, reflect and discuss.
Libraries are essential for connection, and through One Book | One Minnesota, libraries across the state – in partnership with local schools – will connect their communities through stories. The program aims to bring Minnesotans closer together during this time of distance and adversity.
Featured book selections have included Because of Winn-Dixie (Candlewick Press) by Kate DiCamillo, A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota edited by Sun Yung Shin (Minnesota Historical Society Press), The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich, Slider by Pete Hautman, Murder on the Red River by Marcie Rendon, The Song Poet by Kao Kalia Yang, The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse by Brian Farry, Iron Lake by William Kent Krueger, and We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World, edited by Carolyn Holbrook and David Mura.
Program Details
Through their local libraries, Minnesotans will be invited to read the featured book selection and will have access to author videos, reading guides, and virtual book club discussions. All Minnesotans will be invited to participate in a statewide virtual discussion with the author.
Books will be available on multiple platforms. Readers can access the ebook for free on Ebooks Minnesota during the season. Hard copies of the books are available through independent stores across the state, as well as public libraries as physical distancing allows. Information on alternate formats can be found below.
Partner Details
One Book | One Minnesota is presented by The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library, as the Minnesota Center for the Book, in partnership with State Library Services. Program partners also include Council of Regional Public Library System Administrators; Mackin VIA; Minitex; the Minnesota Department of Education; and publishers for the selected titles. This program is made possible in part through an appropriation from the Minnesota State Legislature to The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library as the Minnesota Center for the Book.
Additional Resources
Second chapter resources:
Minnesota Historical Society Press
Reading for Racial Justice - Additional titles available from Minnesota Historical Society Press
Resources on Race - Saint Paul Public Library's list of relevant titles
For individuals who need access to copies of A Good Time for the Truth in an audio format, contact the Minnesota Braille and Talking Book Library (MBTBL). MBTBL, located in Faribault, provides direct library service to preschool age children to seniors with visual, physical and reading disabilities for whom conventional print is a barrier to reading.
For complete eligibility requirements, visit the National Library Service (NLS)'s Eligibility webpage. To apply for service, download and complete an NLS Application for Free Library Service and return to MBTBL by mail, fax or email. For more information, contact Catherine A. Durivage, Library Program Director ([email protected], 507-384-6860).
One Book Chapter 15: What Lolo Wants by Cristina Oxtra
About the Book
Maria loves to spend her days drawing with her grandfather, Lolo. But when Lolo begins to forget things, Maria must come up with a creative way to figure out what Lolo wants. This story is based on Cristina's experience with her grandfather when he became ill and began to lose his memory.
About the Author
Cristina Oxtra earned an MFA in creative writing for children and young adults and a BA in journalism. She writes picture books, chapter books, middle grade, and graphic novels. Her picture book, What Lolo Wants, is a 2025 Minnesota Book Awards Finalist and Society of Midland Authors Awards Honoree. She earned a 2025 McKnight Artist & Culture Bearer Fellowship Honorable Mention and received the Mirrors & Windows Fellowship at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis, where she has served as a teaching artist. A Filipino American and part of MN BIPOC Kidlit Creators, Cristina is a former journalist, former educator, an Air Force veteran, and public relations professional.
One Book Chapter 14: Evidence of V: a Novel in Fragments, Facts, and Fictions by Sheila O'Connor
About the Book
A blend of fact and fiction, including family secrets, documents from the era, and a thin, fragmentary case file unsealed by the court, Sheila O’Connor tells the riveting story of V, a talented fifteen-year-old singer in 1930s Minneapolis who aspires to be a star. Drawing on the little-known American practice of incarcerating adolescent girls for “immorality” in the first half of the twentieth century, O’Connor follows young V from her early work as a nightclub entertainer to her subsequent six-year state school sentence for an unplanned pregnancy. As V struggles to survive within a system only nominally committed to rescue and reform, she endures injustices that will change the course of her life and the lives of her descendants.
About the Author
Sheila O’Connor is the award-winning author of six novels. Her work has been widely anthologized and published in many magazines and journals. She is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and has been awarded two Bush Fellowships, Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grants, and a McKnight Fellowship. She has been a residency fellow at Yaddo, The Studios of Key West, Anderson Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, Tyrone Guthrie Center, and elsewhere. She is a professor of Creative Writing at Hamline University.
One Book Chapter 13: Where We Come From by Diane Wilson, Sun Yung Shin, Shannon Gibney & John Coy
About Where We Come From
In this unique collaboration, four authors lyrically explore where they each come from – literally and metaphorically – as well as what unites all of us as humans. Richly layered illustrations connect past and present, making for an accessible and visually striking look at history, family, and identity.
About the Authors
Diane Wilson is an award-winning writer, speaker, and editor. Her work includes Spirit Car: Journey to a Dakota Past and The Seed Keeper, both of which won the Minnesota Book Award, and Beloved Child: A Dakota Way of Life. Her essays have been featured in many publications, including We Are Meant to Rise; Kinship: Belonging in a World of Relations; and A Good Time for the Truth. Wilson is a Mdewakanton descendent, enrolled on the Rosebud Reservation.
신 선 영 Sun Yung Shin is a Korean American poet, fiction writer, nonfiction writer, editor, and educator. Her books include four collections of poetry: The Wet Hex; Unbearable Splendor, a Minnesota Book Award winner; Rough, and Savage; and Skirt Full of Black, Asian American Literary Award winner. Her poetry has been supported with fellowships and grants from the MacDowell Residency, the Archibald Bush Foundation, the McKnight Foundation, and the Minnesota State Arts Board. She lives in Minneapolis near Minnehaha Creek.
Shannon Gibney is a writer, educator, activist, and the author of See No Color, Dream Country, and The Girl I Am, Was, and Will Never Be, young adult novels that won Minnesota Book Awards. Gibney is faculty in English at Minneapolis College, where she teaches writing. A Bush Artist and McKnight Writing Fellow, she lives in Minneapolis with her family.
John Coy is the author of young adult novels, the 4 for 4 middle-grade series, and nonfiction and fiction picture books including Hoop Genius, Game Changer, Their Great Gift, Dads, and If We Were Gone. He has received numerous awards for his work including a Marion Vannett Ridgway Award, a Charlotte Zolotow Honor, a Bank Street College Best Book of the Year, and the Burr/Warzalla Award for Distinguished Achievement in Children's Literature. Coy lives by the Mississippi River in Minneapolis.
One Book Chapter 12: Sharks in the Time of Saviors by Kawai Strong Washburn
Summer 2024
About Sharks in the Time of Saviors
In 1995 Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, on a rare family vacation, seven-year-old Nainoa Flores falls overboard a cruise ship into the Pacific Ocean. When a shiver of sharks appears in the water, everyone fears for the worst. But instead, Noa is gingerly delivered to his mother in the jaws of a shark, marking his story as the stuff of legends and a sign of divine favor.
But as time passes, this supposed divine favor begins to drive the family apart: Nainoa, working now as a paramedic on the streets of Portland, struggles to fathom the full measure of his expanding abilities; further north in Washington, his older brother Dean hurtles into the world of elite college athletics, obsessed with wealth and fame; while in California, risk-obsessed younger sister Kaui navigates an unforgiving academic workload in an attempt to forge her independence from the family’s legacy.
Kawai Strong Washburn was born and raised on the Hamakua coast of the Big Island of Hawai’i. His first novel, Sharks in the Time of Saviors, Won the 2021 PEN/Hemingway award for debut novel and the 2021 Minnesota Book Award; it was also longlisted for the 2020 Center For Fiction First Novel Prize and was a finalist for the 2021 PEN/Jean Stein Book Award. Former US President Barack Obama chose it as a favorite novel of 2020, and it was selected as a notable or best book of the year by over a dozen publications, including the New York Times and Boston Globe. It has also been translated into eight languages and counting. Washburn lives with his wife and two daughters in Minneapolis.
One Book Chapter 11: In the Night of Memory by Linda LeGarde Grover
Summer 2023
About In the Night of Memory
When Loretta surrenders her young girls to the county and then disappears, she becomes one more missing Native woman in Indian Country’s long devastating history of loss. But she is also a daughter of the Mozhay Point Reservation in northern Minnesota and the mother of Azure and Rain, ages 3 and 4, and her absence haunts all the lives she has touched—and all the stories they tell in this novel. In the Night of Memory returns to the fictional reservation of Linda LeGarde Grover’s previous award-winning books, introducing readers to a new generation of the Gallette family as Azure and Rain make their way home.
About the Author
Linda LeGarde Grover is professor emeritus of American Indian studies at the University of Minnesota Duluth and a member of the Bois Forte Band of Ojibwe. Her novel The Road Back to Sweetgrass (Minnesota, 2014) received the Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers Fiction Award as well as the Native Writers Circle of the Americas First Book Award. The Dance Boots, a book of stories, received the Flannery O’Connor Award and the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize, and her poetry collection The Sky Watched: Poems of Ojibwe Lives received the Red Mountain Press Editor’s Award and the 2017 Northeastern Minnesota Book Award for Poetry. Onigamiising: Seasons of an Ojibwe Year (Minnesota, 2017) won the 2018 Minnesota Book Award for Memoir and Creative Nonfiction and the Northeastern Minnesota Book Award.
One Book Special Edition: Follow the Blackbirds by Gwen Nell Westerman, Poetry Month 2023
About the Book
In language as perceptive as it is poignant, Westerman builds a world in words that reflects the past, present, and future of the Dakota people. An intricate balance between the singularity of personal experience and the unity of collective longing, Follow the Blackbirds speaks to the affection and appreciation a contemporary poet feels for her family, community, and environment. With touches of humor and the occasional sharp cultural criticism, the voice that emerges from these poems is that of a Dakota woman rooted in her world and her words. In this moving collection, Westerman reflects on history and family from a unique perspective, one that connects the painful past and the hard-fought future of her Dakota homeland. Grounded in vivid story and memory, Westerman draws on both English and the Dakota language to celebrate the long journey along sunflower-lined highways of the tallgrass prairies of the Great Plains that returns her to a place filled with “more than history.” An intense homage to the power of place, this book tells a masterful story of cultural survival and the power of language.
About the Author
Gwen Nell Westerman’s roots are deep in the landscape of the tall grass prairie and reveal themselves in her art and writing through the languages and traditions of her family. Since 2005, she has been creating quilts that have won awards at the juried shows of the Northern Plains Indian Art Market in Sioux Falls, the Eiteljorg Indian Art Market in Indianapolis, and the Heard Museum Guild Indian Art Fair and Market in Phoenix. She is an enrolled member of the Sisseton-Wahpeton Dakota Oyate. Westerman is the co-author of Mni Sota Makoce: The Land of the Dakota which won a 2013 Minnesota Book Award and the 2014 Hognander Minnesota History Award. She also has a collection of poetry in Dakota and English, Follow the Blackbirds. Westerman holds her BA and MA in English from Oklahoma State University, and PhD in English from the University of Kansas. She teaches American and Native Nations literatures, Technical Communication, and Humanities to undergraduate and graduate students at Minnesota State University, Mankato. She received the Douglas R. Moore Faculty Research Award for her work on Dakota history and language and is a Distinguished Faculty Scholar in recognition of her work as a scholar, poet, and artist.
One Book Ninth Chapter: We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World, edited by Carolyn Holbrook and David Mura
Fall 2022
About We Are Meant to Rise
In this collection, Indigenous writers and writers of color bear witness to one of the most unsettling years in the history of the United States. Essays and poems vividly reflect and comment on the traumas we endured in 2020, beginning with the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic crisis, deepened by the blatant murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers and the uprisings that immersed the city into the epicenter of passionate, worldwide demands for justice. In inspired and incisive writing these contributors speak unvarnished truths not only to the original and pernicious racism threaded through the American experience but also to the deeply personal, in essays about family, loss, food culture, economic security, and mental health. Their call and response is united here to rise and be heard.
We Are Meant to Rise lifts up the astonishing variety of BIPOC writers in Minnesota and meets the events of the day, the year, the centuries before, again and again, with powerful testament to the intrinsic and unique value of the human voice.
Click here to read bios for the contributors.
One Book Eighth Chapter: Iron Lake by William Kent Krueger
Summer 2022
Iron Lake is the first novel in the bestselling Cork O’Connor mystery series and winner of the Minnesota Book Award and Anthony Award for Best First Novel. Part Irish, part Anishinaabe Indian, Corcoran “Cork” O’Connor is the former sheriff of Aurora, Minnesota. Embittered over losing his job as a cop and over the marital meltdown that has separated him from his wife and children, Cork gets by on heavy doses of caffeine, nicotine, and guilt. Once a cop on Chicago’s South Side, there’s not much that can shock him. But when a powerful local politician is brutally murdered the same night a young Indian boy goes missing, Cork takes on a harrowing case of corruption, conspiracy, and scandal. As a blizzard buries Aurora, Cork must dig for answers before more people, among them those he loves, will die.
Raised in the Cascade Mountains of Oregon, William Kent Krueger briefly attended Stanford University—before being kicked out for radical activities. After that, he logged timber, worked construction, tried his hand at freelance journalism, and eventually ended up researching child development at the University of Minnesota. He’s been married for nearly fifty years to a marvelous woman who is a retired attorney. He makes his home in St. Paul, a city he dearly loves. His work has received a number of awards, including the Minnesota Book Award, the Loft-McKnight Fiction Award, the Anthony Award, the Barry Award, the Dilys Award, and the Friends of American Writers Prize. His last nine novels were all New York Times bestsellers. Ordinary Grace, his stand-alone novel published in 2013, received the Edgar Award, given by the Mystery Writers of America in recognition for the best novel published in that year. The companion novel, This Tender Land, was published in September 2019 and spent nearly six months on the New York Times bestseller list.
One Book Seventh Chapter: The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse by Brian Farrey
Spring 2022
About The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse
In the center of the verdant Monarchy lies Dreadwillow Carse, a desolate bog the people of the land do their best to ignore. Little is known about it except an ominous warning: If any monarch enters Dreadwillow Carse, then the Monarchy will fall. Twelve-year-old Princess Jeniah yearns to know what the marsh could conceal that might topple her family’s thousand-year reign. After a chance meeting, Princess Jeniah strikes a secret deal with Aon, a girl from a nearby village: Aon will explore the Carse on the princess’s behalf, and Jeniah will locate Aon’s missing father. But when Aon doesn’t return from the Carse, a guilt-stricken Jeniah must try and rescue her friend—even if it means risking the entire Monarchy. In this thrilling modern fairytale, Brian Farrey has created an exciting new world where friendship is more powerful than fate and the most important thing is to question everything.
Brian Farrey is a two-time winner of the Minnesota Book Award and the 2017 recipient of the McKnight Fellowship in Children’s Literature. His debut novel, With or Without You, was named a Stonewall honor book by the American Library Association and won the 2012 Minnesota Book Award for Young People’s Literature. The first book in his critically acclaimed middle grade fantasy trilogy (The Vengekeep Prophecies) was named a Junior Library Guild selection, appeared on the Winter 2012-2013 Kids’ Indie Next List, and was listed as one of Kirkus Reviews’ “Best Children’s Books of 2012.” The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse, won the inaugural Minnesota Book Award for Middle Grade Literature in 2017. His most recent book is The Counterclockwise Heart, released in February of 2022. He lives in the Twin Cities with his husband and their cats.
One Book Sixth Chapter: The Song Poet by Kao Kalia Yang
Fall 2021
About The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father
In the Hmong tradition, the song poet recounts the story of his people, their history and tragedies, joys and losses. He keeps the past alive, invokes the spirits and the homeland, and records courtships, births, weddings, and wishes. In The Song Poet, Kao Kalia Yang retells the life of her father, Bee Yang, the song poet―a Hmong refugee in Minnesota, driven from the mountains of Laos by America’s Secret War. Bee sings the life of his people through the war-torn jungle and a Thai refugee camp. The songs fall away in the cold, bitter world of a St. Paul housing project and on the factory floor, until, with the death of Bee’s mother, they leave him for good. But before they do, Bee, with his poetry, has burnished a life of poverty for his children, polishing their grim reality so that they might shine.
Kao Kalia Yang is a Hmong-American writer. She is the author of the memoirs The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir, The Song Poet, and Somewhere in the Unknown World. Yang is also the author of the children’s books A Map Into the World, The Shared Room, The Most Beautiful Thing, and Yang Warriors. She co-edited the ground-breaking collection What God is Honored Here?: Writings on Miscarriage and Infant Loss By and For Native Women and Women of Color. Yang’s work has been recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Chautauqua Prize, the PEN USA literary awards, the Dayton’s Literary Peace Prize, as Notable Books by the American Library Association, Kirkus Best Books of the Year, the Heartland Bookseller’s Award, and garnered four Minnesota Book Awards. Kao Kalia Yang lives in Minnesota with her family and teaches and speaks across the nation.
One Book Fifth Chapter: Murder on the Red River by Marcie Rendon
Summer 2021
Murder on the Red River is Marcie Rendon’s debut mystery novel. In it the reader is introduced to Cash, a tough, 19-year-old Anishinaabe woman who was taken away from the reservation as a child and grew up in more foster homes than she can remember. Now a farm laborer and pool shark in Fargo, ND, Cash’s life changes when a dead body is found on the Minnesota side of the Red River and her longtime friend, Sheriff Wheaton, enlists her to help solve the case.
Marcie Rendon is an enrolled member of the White Earth Anishinaabe Nation. She is a recipient of the Loft’s Inroads Writers of Color Award for Native Americans and the 2020 McKnight Distinguished Artist Award. She is the creative mind behind Raving Native Theater and has curated community-created performances like Art Is..Creative Native Resilience. She is the author of a children’s book, Pow Wow Summer and a second mystery novel featuring Cash, Girl Gone Missing. Marcie Rendon has stories, poetry, and essays featured in several anthologies.
One Book Fourth Chapter: Slider by Pete Hautman
Spring 2021
About Slider
David can eat an entire sixteen-inch pepperoni pizza in four minutes and thirty-six seconds. But he’ll have to do better if he’s going to win the Super Pigorino Bowl pizza-eating contest. And he has to win because he accidently put $2,000 on his mom’s credit card. So he really needs that prize money. Like, yesterday. As if training to be a competitive eater weren’t enough, he’s also got to keep an eye on his little brother, Mal (who would be labeled autistic if their family believed in labels). But maybe David’s bottomless appetite isn’t his only talent.
Pete Hautman is the author of many books for young adults and adults, including the National Book Award– winning Godless, the science fiction trilogy Klaatu Diskos, and Eden West, which Booklist praised in a starred review as “thought-provoking and quietly captivating.” He divides his time between Wisconsin and Minnesota.
One Book Third Chapter: The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
Fall 2020
In The Plague of Doves, a Minnesota Book Award winner and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, the unsolved murder of a farm family haunts the small, white off-reservation town of Pluto, North Dakota. The vengeance exacted for this crime, and the subsequent distortions of truth transform the lives of Ojibwe living on the nearby reservation and shape the passions of both communities for the next generation. Bound by love and torn by history, the collective stories of the two communities come together in a wrenching truth that is revealed in the novel’s final pages.
Louise Erdrich is the author of fifteen novels as well as volumes of poetry, children’s books, short stories, and a memoir of early motherhood. Her novel The Round House won the National Book Award for Fiction. The Plague of Doves won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and her debut novel, Love Medicine, was the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award. Erdrich has received the Library of Congress Prize in American Fiction, the prestigious PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. She lives in Minnesota with her daughters and is the owner of Birchbark Books, a small independent bookstore.
One Book Second Chapter: A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota
Summer 2020
About A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota
In this provocative book, sixteen of Minnesota’s best writers provide a range of perspectives on what it is like to live as a Native person or a person of color in Minnesota. With unflinching generosity, these authors take readers into their lives, sharing experiences that we all must understand if we are to come together in real relationships.
Minnesota communities struggle with some of the nation’s worst racial disparities. As its authors confront and consider the realities that lie beneath the numbers, this book provides an important tool to those who want to be part of closing those gaps.
As the book’s editor, Sun Yung Shin, writes in the introduction: “These essays…are intended to enlarge our understanding of, and deepen our connections to, one another. These writers are here to feed our spirits, if we let them. As readers and listeners we have an important job to do, a powerful and empowering attitude to assume: “Tell me the truth of the matter. When I don’t understand, I will not protest or judge or correct, I will simply listen harder. I am here to recognize you as my fellow human being with a story.” We can read their stories and leave each one with a deeper, more complex understanding of how race and culture are lived in Minnesota – and better prepared for the conversations and changes ahead.”
About the Contributors
신 선 영 Sun Yung Shin was born in Seoul, Korea, during 박 정 희 Park Chung-hee's military dictatorship, and grew up in the Chicago area. She is the editor of the best-selling anthology A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota, author of poetry collections Unbearable Splendor (finalist for the 2017 PEN USA Literary Award for Poetry, winner of the 2016 Minnesota Book Award for poetry); Rough, and Savage; and Skirt Full of Black (winner of the 2007 Asian American Literary Award for poetry), co-editor of Outsiders Within: Writing on Transracial Adoption, and author of bilingual illustrated book for children Cooper’s Lesson. She lives in Minneapolis where she co-directs the community organization Poetry Asylum with poet Su Hwang.
Taiyon J. Coleman’s writing has appeared in Bum Rush the Page; Sauti Mypya, Drumvoices Revue, Riding Shotgun; The Ringing Ear; Blues Vision; How Dare We! Write; and Places Journal. Her essay, “Sometimes I Feel like Harriet Tubman,” appears in the fall 2018 issue of Minnesota Alumni Magazine, and Taiyon has an essay forthcoming in Shadowlands: An Illustrated Reader in Racialized Violence in America, Selected Writings on the Art of Ken Gonzales-Day (Minnesota Museum of American Art). Taiyon is a 2017 recipient of a McKnight Foundation Artist Fellowship in Creative Prose, and she is Assistant Professor of English Literature at St. Catherine University in St. Paul, Minnesota. Currently, Taiyon is working on her YA novel, Chicago@Fifteen.
Heid E. Erdrich is Ojibwe, enrolled at Turtle Mountain. She is author of seven collections of poetry, and Original Local: Indigenous Foods, Stories, and Recipes from the Upper Midwest, and co-editor of Sister Nations: Native American Writers on Community. She edited the recent anthology New Poets of Native Nations and has a forthcoming collection of poetry, Little Big Bully (October 2020). She mentors MFA students at Augsburg College.
Venessa Fuentes is from Minneapolis. She is also from its arts, queer, and BIPOC communities. Her writing has been anthologized, read at poetry picnics, shared at the dinner table, and turned into public art. Along with her son, Venessa claims the Southside as Home.
Shannon Gibney is a writer, educator, activist, and author. A Bush Artist and McKnight Writing Fellow, her young adult novels Dream Country and See No Color are both Minnesota Book Award-winners. She is co-editor of the recent anthology What God is Honored Here: Writings on Miscarriage and Infant Loss by and for Native Women and Women of Color. Gibney is faculty in English at Minneapolis Community and Technical College, where she teaches critical and creative writing, journalism, and African Diasporic topics.
David Lawrence Grant has written drama for the stage, film, and television, as well as fiction and memoir. He has written major reports on racial bias in the justice system for the Minnesota Supreme Court and on racial disparities in the health care system for the Minnesota legislature. He teaches screenwriting at FilmNorth.
Carolyn Holbrook is a writer, educator, and longtime advocate for the healing power of the arts. She is founder and director of More Than a Single Story, and Executive Editor of the Saint Paul Almanac. She is the author of a new essay collection, Tell Me Your Names and I Will Testify and is co-author with Arleta Little of MN civil rights icon, Dr. Josie R. Johnson’s memoir, Hope In the Struggle. Her personal essays have been published in A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota and Blues Vision: African American Writing from Minnesota. She received the Kay Sexton Award from the Minnesota Book Awards, and two Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grants, and a 50 over 50 award from AARP & Pollen/Midwest. She teaches creative writing at Hamline University and other community venues.
IBé lives in the Middle of the Atlantic, between Guinea, Sierra Leone and the US. From here he writes poetry, essays and short stories about aliens and the sea. He is the recipient of numerous recognitions, such as Verve Grant and Midwestern Voices Award, but considers fatherhood his most valuable work. During the day, he works as an IT Project Manager, and spends his in-between time looking for the perfect fries.
Andrea Jenkins is a writer, performance artist, poet and transgender activist. She is the first African American openly trans woman to be elected to office in the United States. Since January 2018, she has served as Vice President of the Minneapolis City Council. A Bush Fellow and a locally and nationally recognized poet, she has earned many awards, fellowships, and commissions. She is an oral historian at the Tretter Collection at the University of Minnesota Archives.
RobertFaridKarimi, critically-acclaimed performer, author and social engagement artist, designs interactive immersive game-performance experiences to spark players to imagine worlds of mutual community nourishment. A Creative Capital artist, Pushcart Prize-nominated writer, National Poetry Slam Champion, their work has been published in various platforms worldwide. Karimi serves as Associate Professor in the Film, Dance and Theater department at Arizona State University.
JaeRan Kim is assistant professor at University of Washington Tacoma. JaeRan’s writing and scholarship focuses on the intersections of race, disability, gender, and kinship of vulnerable children and families.
Sherry Quan Lee, MFA, University of Minnesota, is the author of Chinese Blackbird, a memoir in verse; Love Imagined: a mixed race memoir (a Minnesota Book Award Finalist); and the picture book And You Can Love Me: a story for everyone who loves someone with ASD, published 2019 by LHP, Ann Arbor, MI. She is the editor of How Dare We! Write: a multicultural creative writing discourse, an anthology finding home in university writing classrooms. Her forthcoming work, in Spring 2021, is Septuagenarian: love is what happens when I die.
David Mura's latest book is A Stranger's Journey: Race, Identity & Narrative Craft in Writing, which centers racial identity as a key component of creative writing. He has written two memoirs: Turning Japanese, a Josephine Miles Book Award/Oakland PEN winner and a New York Times Notable Book, and Where the Body Meets Memory. Additional works: the novel Famous Suicides of the Japanese Empire and four books of poetry, including The Last Incantations. Mura is the Minnesota Book Awards 2019 Kay Sexton Award recipient.
Bao Phi was born in Saigon and raised in the Phillips neighborhood of South Minneapolis. He is the author of two collections of poetry and the award-winning children’s book A Different Pond and the recently released My Footprints. He has been a performance poet and has struggled to contribute to social justice movements since he was a teenager. He is grateful to the many artists and community organizers who have influenced him.
Rodrigo Sanchez-Chavarria is a writer and spoken word poet of Peruvian heritage involved with Palabristas, a Minnesota-based Latin@ poets collective. He is an MFA student at Hamline University and writes about fatherhood, the duality of two cultures in English, Spanglish, and Spanish, and issues pertaining to his community.
Diane Wilson (Dakota) has published a memoir, Spirit Car: Journey to a Dakota Past, the 2012 One Minneapolis One Read selection, and a nonfiction book, Beloved Child: A Dakota Way of Life. Her new novel, The Seed Keeper, will be published by Milkweed Editions in Spring, 2021. She is the executive director for Native American Food Sovereignty Alliance, a national coalition.
Kao Kalia Yang is a Hmong American writer and the award-winning author of The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir and The Song Poet. She is co-editor of What God is Honored Here: Writings on Miscarriage and Infant Loss by and for Native Women and Women of Color and author of the children’s books A Map Into the World and the newly released The Shared Room.
One Book First Chapter: Because of Winn-Dixie
Summer 2020
Download 20th Anniversary Winn Dixie Press Release
About Kate DiCamillo
Kate DiCamillo’s writing journey has been a truly remarkable one. She grew up in Florida and moved to Minnesota in her twenties, when homesickness and a bitter winter led her to write Because of Winn-Dixie — her first published novel, which became a runaway bestseller and snapped up a Newbery Honor. That book celebrates its 20th anniversary in 2020, and has almost 12 million copies in print.
The Tiger Rising, her second novel, was also set in Florida and went on to become a National Book Award finalist. Since then, the bestselling author has explored settings as varied as a medieval castle and a magician’s theater while continuing to enjoy great success, winning two Newbery Medals and being named National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature.
In 2016, Kate DiCamillo published her most autobiographical novel to date, Raymie Nightingale, which was a National Book Award finalist. And then, for the first time ever, she returned to the world of a previous novel in Louisiana’s Way Home to tell us more about a character that her fans already knew and loved. That novel garnered seven starred reviews and was, like its predecessor, a #1 New York Times bestseller. And now Kate DiCamillo returns once more to complete the Three Rancheros’ stories by writing a book about tough-as-nails Beverly Tapinski.
Kate DiCamillo’s books’ themes of hope and belief amid impossible circumstances and their messages of shared humanity and connectedness have resonated with readers of all ages around the world. In her instant #1 New York Times bestseller The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, a haughty china rabbit undergoes a profound transformation after finding himself face down on the ocean floor — lost and waiting to be found. The Tale of Despereaux — the Newbery Medal–winning novel that later inspired an animated adventure from Universal Pictures — stars a tiny mouse with exceptionally large ears who is driven by love to become an unlikely hero. The Magician’s Elephant, an acclaimed and exquisitely paced fable, dares to ask the question What if ? And Kate DiCamillo’s second Newbery Medal winner, Flora & Ulysses, was released in 2013 to great acclaim, garnering five starred reviews and an instant spot on the New York Times bestseller list.
Born in Philadelphia but raised in the South, Kate DiCamillo now lives in Minneapolis.
One Book Chapter 15: What Lolo Wants by Cristina Oxtra
One Book Chapter 14: Evidence of V: a Novel in Fragments, Facts, and Fictions by Sheila O'Connor
Click on the image above or this link to download the book cover.
Click on the image above or this link to download the author headshot.
One Book Chapter 13: Where We Come From by Diane Wilson, Sun Yung Shin, Shannon Gibney & John Coy
Download the combined author and book cover image here.
Download the book cover image here.
Download the author image here.
One Book Chapter 12: Sharks in the Time of Saviors by Kawai Strong Washburn Summer 2024
Download the book cover image here.
Download the author headshot here.
One Book Chapter 11: In the Night of Memory by Linda LeGarde Grover Summer 2023
Download the book cover image.
Download Linda LeGarde Grover headshot.
One Book Bonus Edition: Follow the Blackbirds by Gwen Nell Westerman, Poetry Month 2023
Download the book cover image.
Download Gwen Nell Westerman's headshot.
One Book Ninth Chhapter: We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World, edited by Carolyn Holbrook and David Mura
Fall 2022
Download the book cover image.
Download Carolyn Holbrook's headshot or David Mura's headshot.
One Book Eighth Chapter: Iron Lake by William Kent Krueger
Summer 2022
Download the book cover image.
One Book Seventh Chapter: The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse by Brian Farrey
Spring 2022
Download the book cover image.
One Book Sixth Chapter: The Song Poet by Kao Kalia Yang
Fall 2021
Download The Song Poet cover image.
Download Kao Kalia Yang's headshot.
One Book Fifth Chapter: Murder on the Red River by Marcie Rendon
Summer 2021
Download Murder on the Red River cover image.
Download Marcie Rendon's headshot.
One Book Fourth Chapter: Slider by Pete Hautman
Spring 2021
Download Pete Hautman headshot.
Download Pete's One Book intro video (1-minute version).
View or embed Pete's One Book intro video (2-minute version).
Watch this PBS conversation with Pete Hautman and fellow young adult author Will Weaver.
One Book Third Chapter: The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
Fall 2020
Download The Plague of Doves cover image.
Download Louise Erdrich headshot.
One Book Second Chapter: A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota
Summer 2020
Download A Good Time for the Truth cover image.
One Book First Chapter: Because of Winn-Dixie
Spring 2020
Download short intro video from Kate.
Download program intro video version 1 from Kate.
Chapter 15 Author Conversation with Cristina Oxtra
Wednesday, April 29 | 10:00 a.m.
Register here.
Chapter 14 Author Conversation with Sheila O'Connor
Wednesday, September 17 | 7:00 p.m.
Watch the recording here.
Chapter 13 Author Conversation with Diane Wilson, Sun Yung Shin, Shannon Gibney & John Coy
Tuesday, April 29 | 10:00 a.m.
Watch the recording here.
Chapter 12 Virtual Author Conversation with Kawai Strong Washburn
Wednesday, August 21, 2024 | 7:00 p.m.
Watch the recording here.
Chapter 11 Virtual Author Conversation
with Linda LeGarde Grover
Wednesday, September 6 | 7:00 p.m.
Watch recording here
Linda LeGarde Grover will take part in a statewide discussion about her book In the Night of Memory and other work.
The Poetry Month Special Edition will not include a virtual author discussion.
One Book Ninth Chapter
Virtual Author Discussion
Panel discussion featuring contributors from We Are Meant to Rise
Wednesday, December 7 | 7:00 p.m. CST
Watch Recording Here
Carolyn Holbrook, Douglas Kearney, Ed Bok Lee, Ricardo Levins Morales, David Mura, & Melissa Olson discussed the collection We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World, the ninth featured title in our statewide bookclub.
One Book Eighth Chapter
Virtual Author Discussion
Featuring William Kent Krueger in conversation with Ellen Hart
Thursday, August 11 | 7:00 p.m. CDT
Watch recording
One Book Seventh Chapter
Virtual Author Discussion
Featuring Brian Farrey
Wednesday, May 11 | 1:00 p.m. CDT
Watch the recording
Brian Farrey took part in a statewide discussion about his book The Secret of Dreadwillow Carse, the seventh featured title in our statewide bookclub.
One Book Sixth Chapter: The Song Poet: Memoirs of My Father by Kao Kalia Yang
Fall 2021
One Book Sixth Chapter Author Discussion
Featuring Kao Kalia Yang
Thursday, December 9 | 7:00 p.m.
Watch the Recording
One Book Fifth Chapter: Murder on the Red River by Marcie Rendon
Summer 2021
One Book Fifth Chapter Author Discussion
Featuring Marcie Rendon in conversation with Allison Waukau
Tuesday, August 31 | 7:00 p.m. CDT | Watch Recording
Marcie Rendon took part in a statewide discussion about her book Murder on the Red River, the fifth featured title in our statewide bookclub.
One Book Fourth Chapter: Slider by Pete Hautman
Spring 2021
One Book Fourth Chapter Virtual Author Discussion
Wednesday, April 21, 2020 | 1:00 p.m. CDT | Watch recording
Pete Hautman took part in a statewide discussion about his book, Slider, the fourth featured title in our statewide bookclub One Book | One Minnesota.
One Book Third Chapter: The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
Fall 2020
One Book Third Chapter Virtual Author Discussion
Tuesday, December 8 | 7:00 p.m. CST | View Recording
Louise Erdrich took part in a statewide discussion about her book, The Plague of Doves, the third featured title in our statewide bookclub One Book | One Minnesota.
One Book Second Chapter: A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota
Summer 2020
One Book Second Chapter Virtual Author Discussion
Thursday, August 20 | 7:00 p.m. CDT | View Recording
Featuring editor Sun Yung Shin in conversation with contributors Taiyon Coleman, Shannon Gibney, David Lawrence Grant, Carolyn Holbrook, IBé, and Andrea Jenkins.
One Book First Chapter: Because of Winn-Dixie
Spring 2020
THANK YOU to all those who participated in our very first One Book program! We had almost 2,400 people from 47 states register for the online discussion with Kate DiCamillo. Watch the recorded discussion here.
About the event: Kate DiCamillo will host a statewide virtual discussion about her book Because of Winn-Dixie, the first featured title in our statewide bookclub One Book | One Minnesota. Kate will be in conversation with Saint Paul Public Librarian Eric Byrd, answering questions from readers across Minnesota in this one-of-a-kind event.
One Book Ninth Chapter: We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World edited by Carolyn Holbrook and David Mura
Select contributors from this featured title are available for virtual or in-person events. Please contact the University of Minnesota Press at [email protected] to inquire about engaging an author. View or download the full list of available contributors with bios here.
Contributors available for in-person or virtual events: Sherrie Fernandez-Williams, Shannon Gibney, Kathryn Haddad, Carolyn Holbrook, Tish Jones, Douglas Kearney, Tess Montgomery, David Mura, Marcie Rendon, Samantha Sencer-Mura, Erin Sharkey, 신 선 영 辛善英 Sun Yung Shin, Michael Torres, and Kevin Yang.
Contributors available for virtual events only: Pamela R. Fletcher Bush, Ed Bok Lee, Resmaa Menakem, Melissa Olson, Alexs Pate, Mona Susan Power, Diane Wilson, and Kao Kalia Yang.
One Book Fifth Chapter: Murder on the Red River by Marcie Rendon
Marcie Rendon is available for interviews and events. To inquire about availability, please contact Erica Loberg: [email protected].
One Book Second Chapter: A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota
Summer 2020
Available contributors
The contributing authors listed below are available to speak about their work. If you’re interested in hiring a contributor for a possible program, please contact Alayne Hopkins at [email protected] for availability and stipend information. (Our recommendation is that a facilitator also be present to moderate group discussions. If you're interested in hiring an experienced facilitator, see available contacts below.)
Contributors: Taiyon J. Coleman, Heid E. Erdrich, Shannon Gibney, David Lawrence Grant, Carolyn Holbrook, IBé, Robert Farid Karimi, JaeRan Kim, David Mura, Bao Phi, Rodrigo Sanchez-Chavarria, Diane Wilson, and Kao Kalia Yang
Available facilitators
If your library or book discussion group would like to hire an experienced facilitator, the recommended rate is at least $300 per program. Please contact these individuals directly to arrange logistics and check availability.
(*Denotes contributors to A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota. If you would like to hire a contributor to speak from their perspective as an author in addition to their role as a facilitator, please see list above. Additional fees may be required.)
Facilitators:
Katona is an HR Consultant and Affirmative Action Officer at Minnesota Department of Education.
Shannon is a writer, educator, activist, and author. A Bush Artist and McKnight Writing Fellow, her young adult novels Dream Country and See No Color are both Minnesota Book Award-winners. She is co-editor of the recent anthology What God is Honored Here: Writings on Miscarriage and Infant Loss by and for Native Women and Women of Color. Gibney is faculty in English at Minneapolis Community and Technical College, where she teaches critical and creative writing, journalism, and African Diasporic topics.
Marion is a graduate of Hamline University with a degree in, not surprisingly, English with a concentration in creative writing. As a program associate, she ensures that Loft events from readings to conferences run smoothly. In her free time, she writes and reads poetry, goes for long walks, and practices Spanish with her cat, Paco.
David has written drama for the stage, film, and television, as well as fiction and memoir. He has written major reports on racial bias in the justice system for the Minnesota Supreme Court and on racial disparities in the health care system for the Minnesota legislature. He teaches screenwriting at FilmNorth.
Carolyn Holbrook is a writer, educator, and longtime advocate for the healing power of the arts. She is founder and director of More Than a Single Story, and Executive Editor of the Saint Paul Almanac. She is the author of a new essay collection, Tell Me Your Names and I Will Testify and is co-author with Arleta Little of MN civil rights icon, Dr. Josie R. Johnson’s memoir, Hope In the Struggle. Her personal essays have been published in A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota and Blues Vision: African American Writing from Minnesota. She received the Kay Sexton Award from the Minnesota Book Awards, and two Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grants, and a 50 over 50 award from AARP & Pollen/Midwest. She teaches creative writing at Hamline University and other community venues.
Andrea is a writer, performance artist, poet and transgender activist. She is the first African American openly trans woman to be elected to office in the United States. Since January 2018, she has served as Vice President of the Minneapolis City Council. A Bush Fellow and a locally and nationally recognized poet, she has earned many awards, fellowships, and commissions. She is an oral historian at the Tretter Collection at the University of Minnesota Archives.
Karimi is a critically-acclaimed performer, author and social engagement artist, and designs interactive immersive game-performance experiences to spark players to imagine worlds of mutual community nourishment. A Creative Capital artist, Pushcart Prize-nominated writer, National Poetry Slam Champion, their work published in various platforms worldwide. Karimi serves as Associate Professor in the Film, Dance and Theater department at Arizona State University.
신 선 영 Sun Yung Shin was born in Seoul, Korea, during 박 정 희 Park Chung-hee's military dictatorship, and grew up in the Chicago area. She is the editor of the best-selling anthology A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota, author of poetry collections Unbearable Splendor (finalist for the 2017 PEN USA Literary Award for Poetry, winner of the 2016 Minnesota Book Award for poetry); Rough, and Savage; and Skirt Full of Black (winner of the 2007 Asian American Literary Award for poetry), co-editor of Outsiders Within: Writing on Transracial Adoption, and author of bilingual illustrated book for children Cooper’s Lesson. She lives in Minneapolis where she co-directs the community organization Poetry Asylum with poet Su Hwang.
Mary is the art director of Milkweed Editions. Before joining Milkweed’s staff in 2017, Mary worked in New York trade publishing for ten years, managing the Ecco and Smithsonian imprints for HarperCollins Publishers and designing for Simon & Schuster. She co-founded and curated the Triptych Poetry Series in the East Village, and while studying for her MFA in poetry at Indiana University, she taught creative writing and edited the Indiana Review. She has published two collections of poetry—Ceremony and The Bridge—and edits a chapbook review column for Rain Taxi as well as a series on poetry and power called Society Editions. She has been designing books for Milkweed in a freelance capacity since 2013.
Clarence is a writer, editor, typewriter poet, and arts organizer and administrator. He has worked for a wide range of organizations including the National Farmers Union, the Minnesota State Senate, several nonprofits in the arts, community development, public policy and media, including the Minneapolis Urban League, the Twin Cities Daily Planet, Nonviolent Peaceforce, and the Saint Paul Almanac, and as a bookseller with the Hungry Mind Bookstore. He taught management and organizational behavior at Metropolitan State University and North Hennepin Technical College. His publications are included in several editions of the Saint Paul Almanac, Suisun Valley Review, Public Art Review and the anthology Blues Vision: African American Writing from Minnesota.
Made possible in part by the State of Minnesota through an appropriation to the Minnesota Department of Education
One Book | One Minnesota is a project of The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library as the Minnesota Center for the Book. The Library of Congress designated The Friends as Minnesota’s Center in 2012, and in that role The Friends promotes reading, literacy, and libraries throughout Minnesota. Learn more >>