OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla – “By the Fire We Carry: The Generations-Long Fight for Justice on Native Land” by award winning journalist Rebecca Nagle (Cherokee) was presented the Non-Fiction award at the 36th Annual Oklahoma Book Awards on May 16, 2025.
“I feel really honored that the Oklahoma Book Awards and the Department of Libraries recognized “By the Fire We Carry,” said Nagle.
“It was also cool to be in the category with so many amazing finalists and so many other really good books. It was really cool to also see a lot of Native authors.”“By the Fire We Carry” continues the narrative of Nagle’s This Land podcast which covered the Sharp v. Murphy Supreme Court case that set the stage for the eventual affirmation of MCN Reservation boundaries in Oklahoma. The struggle for sovereignty is meticulously related through stories of Native resistance to removal and assimilation, and illuminates the enduring legacy of survival handed down from generation to generation.
“When I talked to other tribal citizens in Eastern Oklahoma people had a similar reaction (to McGirt). People were happy but also felt the weight of what our ancestors had been through. For us to see that legal victory and have that joy also kind of cut deep in a way, cut us to our core. I wanted the readers to be able to feel that and to be able to understand what that actually meant and what it would have meant for the tribes to have lost,” says Nagle of the book.
The book has previously been awarded the J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize, the Oklahoma Historical Society’s E. E. Dale Award, and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard First Book Prize.
The Oklahoma Book Awards, which recognize books by Oklahomans or books that have an Oklahoma based theme, were presented at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. Co-sponsored by The Oklahoma Center for the Book and Friends of the Oklahoma Center for the Book, The Oklahoma Book Awards recognize works in fiction, non-fiction, children/young adult, poetry, and design/illustration.
Rebecca Nagle recently launched Welcome to Native America, a twice monthly newsletter featuring long form journalism, deep dives on issues affecting Native Nations, and News Round-Ups.
“I think we need diversified voices. I wanted to just have a place where people who were interested in reading my writing and reading my reporting could go to get it consistently and that might be a place for my writing to live, where I can build relationships with readers that last longer than one project,” explains Nagle.
That relational aspect continues to live on in her upcoming work.
Nagle shares, “Right now I’m working on a collaborative project with some other Indigenous writers and scholars. I’m hoping for it to come out next year on the anniversary of the 250th year signing of the Declaration of Independence.”
The project looks at the history of U.S. democracy and how colonization, genocide, and resistance has shaped law and democracy. Nagel says, “It’s a big project looking at U.S. democracy and how both the colonization and genocide of Indigenous people, but also our resistance, has shaped U.S law and democracy in ways that aren’t recognized. Historically Native people have been written out of the American story and whenever we’re not part of the story, we’re not part of public discourse. We’re not part of public policy.”
“That is not just a problem for tribal communities but a problem for our country. We fundamentally don’t understand what our government is or who we are. We haven’t really looked at our history so (we’re) retelling the American story with Native people at the center.
