A Year of Moons - by Joseph Bruchac (Paperback)

About the Book

"Written by renowned Native author, poet, and storyteller Joseph Bruchac, this book is a collection of stories and essays centered around the author's home and the traditional Abenaki lunar cycles of a year, exposing the natural world and our connection to the land, the plants, and the animals that surround us. Interspersing traditional Native tales and poems with stories from his own life and contemporary Native life, the author highlights how each lunar month represents a unique time of year in the Abenaki calendar and natural world. Each essay also contains haikus written by the author that further illuminate the beauty of the world around us."--

Book Synopsis

"There's a fresh coating of snow on the ground outside our cabin as I look to see who's coming to the fourteen feeders, we keep filled with black oil sunflower seeds year-round." So begins A Year of Moons: Stories from the Adirondack Foothills, a collection of essays by award winning author Joeseph Bruchac. The collection is a reflection on the rhythms of the land, the lunar cycles of the year, the plants and animals that surround us, and the connections that link humans, animals and the land. With one foot rooted firmly in the inheritance of nature essays, and another rooted firmly in Bruchac's Abenaki heritage, the collection is an artifact of a beautiful landscape and the changes it encounters throughout the year. In his thoughtful and perceptive way, Bruchac contemplates the changing of the seasons, his relationship with the creatures and plant life that share his home, and a vision of stewardship. Bruchac's curiosity and reverence for the earth shines through on every page as he looks at the place he calls home with new eyes, reflected by the changing of each season's moon.

Review Quotes

Winner in the nature category for the NYC Big Book Award

Winner in Nature/Indigenous/First-Nations Nonfiction

A Year of Moons is the winner of the 17th Annual National Indie Excellence Awards in Nature/Indigenous/First-Nations Non-Fiction.

Year of Moons by Joseph Bruchac is a Finalist in the BIPOC category in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards, which is the largest international awards program for indie authors and independent publishers.

"A Year of Moons is a rich, eclectic combination of what Bruchac has seen and learned. . . He tells of that life in a gentle storyteller's voice, the kind one listens to at a table in a pub or sitting around a campfire." --Adirondack Daily Enterprise.

"Joseph Bruchac is among our wisest and most enduring storytellers. His voice, his flute, and his tales are grace notes. A Year of Moons speaks to the cyclic nature of Western Abenaki home ground. Within these pages, readers will find an incantation of attention, patience, and what endures through the generations: a fierce love of place." -Terry Tempest Williams, Author of The Hour of Land

"Bruchac's A Year of Moons weaves seasonal observations, remembrances, and stories into each chapter, engaging the reader's imagination, heart, and senses, and then wraps up each one with beautiful haiku. A journey not to be missed!" -Traci Sorell, Author of Powwow Day

"I really appreciate A Year of Moons. It is, in my opinion, not only a summing up of a year, but in many ways a thoughtful glimpse into the world of an extremely talented writer and philosopher. In particular, he makes the Adirondacks vivid and near personal for this Mississippi Delta swamp rat."
- Geary Hobson, Author and Poet

"Bruchac's A Year of Moons weaves seasonal observations, remembrances, and stories into each chapter, engaging the reader's imagination, heart, and senses, and then wraps up each one with beautiful haiku. A journey not to be missed!" --Traci Sorell, Author of Pow Wow Day

About the Author

Joseph Bruchac lives in the Adirondack mountain foothills town of Greenfield Center, New York, in the same house where his maternal grandparents raised him. Much of his writing draws on that land and his Native American ancestry. Although his northeastern American Indian heritage is only one part of an ethnic background that includes Slovak and English blood, those Native roots are the ones by which he has been most nourished.