Oklahoma titles Run Little Chaski! and This Land is Herland were chosen for the National Center for the Book’s Great Reads from Great Places Program. Authors will sign copies of their books at the Festival’s Oklahoma Booth on Saturday, September 3.
The Oklahoma Center for the Book in the Oklahoma Department of Libraries has selected one children’s book and one adult book to represent the state at the 2022 National Book Festival this September in Washington, D.C.
Run Little Chaski! An Inka Trail Adventure by Oklahoma City author Mariana Llanos is the children’s selection for Oklahoma. The adult book for Oklahoma is This is Herland: Gendered Activism in Oklahoma from the 1870s to the 2010s, a collection of essays coedited by Lawton’s Sarah Eppler Janda and Edmond’s Patricia Loughlin. Run Little Chaski! received the 2022 Oklahoma Book Award for the children’s book category, and This Land is Herland was a finalist in the non-fiction category during the 2022 competition.
Both titles will be part of the National Center for the Book’s “Great Reads from Great Places” program. The program features books and authors representing the literary heritage of all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and Northern Marianas. For more than 20 years, this program has highlighted children or young adult titles from each of the state and territorial Centers for the Book. In 2022, “Great Reads from Great Places” is including titles for adults for the first time.
“This is a wonderful opportunity to highlight Oklahoma authors as well as books about our great state,” said Oklahoma Center for the Book Executive Director Connie Armstrong. “The theme of this year’s festival is ‘Books Bring Us Together,’ and people from all over the country and beyond will gather to celebrate reading, literacy, authors, and the book community.”
That 2022 National Book Festival will be held in-person on Saturday, September 3, at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C. It will also include many live-streamed and recorded virtual programs. Festival goers will have the opportunity to meet the Oklahoma authors and have their books signed at the Oklahoma booth in the Roadmap to Reading Pavilion.
More information about the festival and this year’s programming is at: https://www.loc.gov/events/2022-national-book-festival
About the Books and Authors
Run Little Chaski! An Inka Trail Adventure
Little Chaski must be strong, swift, sharp, and most of all, he must not be late! It is his first day delivering royal messages, and he wants to be a good messenger. His first mission is to deliver a message from the queen to the king before sundown. Will Little Chaski accomplish his assignment before the sun goes down? The book includes notes on the Inka Trail, the Inka Empire, Quechua language and more.
Author Mariana Llanos is a Peruvian-born writer of children’s literature. In 2017 she was selected as the Best Latino Artist by the Hispanic Arts Council of Oklahoma. That same year, she also was awarded the Global Citizen Award in Arts by the World Experiences Foundation for her contribution to multicultural literature, and the Human Rights Award given by the United Nations Association of Oklahoma City. Llanos lives in Oklahoma City.
This Land is Herland: Gendered Activism in Oklahoma from the 1870s to the 2010s
Since well before the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 that secured their right to vote, women in Oklahoma sought to change and uplift their communities through political activism. This compilation of essays showcases thirteen female activists and explores their varied experiences from the territorial period to the present. The collection explores how race, ethnicity, social class, gender, and political power shaped, and were shaped by, these women’s efforts to improve their local, state, and national communities.
Sarah Eppler Janda is a professor of history at Cameron University in Lawton, Oklahoma. Her book Prairie Power: Student Activism, Counterculture, and Backlash in Oklahoma 1962-1972, was a 2019 Oklahoma Book Award finalist for non-fiction.
Patricia Loughlin serves as professor of history at the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond. Her book Hidden Treasures of the American West: Muriel H. Wright, Angie Debo, and Alice Marriot won the Directors’ Award from the Oklahoma Center for the Book in 2006. Her book Angie Debo: Daughter of the Prairie won the 2018 Oklahoma Book Award for children/young adult.
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