SATA
ENTRY TYPE: new
WORK TITLE: LOOK, GRANDMA! NI, ELISI!
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: https://artcoulson.com/
CITY: Apple Valley
STATE:
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
LAST VOLUME:
Cherokee.
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1961, in Honolulu, HI; married; children: two daughters.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer, journalist, and editor. Wilma Mankiller Foundation, Cherokee Nation, OK, executive director.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Art Coulson is a writer of children’s books. Before he published his first book, Coulson was a journalist and editor, working for publications across the U.S. He also previously held the title of executive director for the Wilma Mankiller Foundation in Oklahoma’s Cherokee Nation. A Cherokee himself, many of Coulson’s books focus on Native American culture and history.
In 2013, Coulson released his first book, The Creator’s Game: A Story of Baaga’adowe/Lacrosse. In this volume, he examines the Native American connection to the game of lacrosse. Coulson drew from his own experience as a player of baaga’adowe to write the book. In an interview with Sandra Hale Schulman, contributor to the Indian Country Today website, Coulson explained how he being asked to write the book led to his career as a children’s book author. He stated: “I was actually writing books, or trying to write books, for adults at first. … And the first children’s book kind of dropped in my lap. Another writer had been approached by a publisher to write a nonfiction book about the connection of lacrosse to American Indian people. And she said: ‘Well, I don’t know anything about lacrosse, but I know a guy.’ And I was the guy.”
Next from Coulson was another nonfiction volume, Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Defeated the Army. In the book, he told the story of Thorpe, the football player who led his team of underdogs to a notable win over the U.S. Army football team. In an interview with Traci Sorell, contributor to the Cynthia Leitich Smith website, Coulson explained: “As an American Indian, I had a pretty good understanding of the importance of Jim Thorpe and knew the broad outlines of his story. I saw this book as a chance to learn more about him and about the other players on that Carlisle Indian School football team, many of them from tribal communities in my adopted home of Minnesota.” Citing Coulson’s skirting of darker cultural issues related to the story, a Kirkus Reviews writer described the book as “solid if incomplete.” However, Myra Zarnowski, reviewer in School Library Journal, called it “a first choice for nonfiction picture book biography collections.”
Two works of fiction and an essay appear in Coulson’s 2020 volume, The Reluctant Storyteller. The first work in the book, a novella, finds young Maurice “Chooch” Tenkiller traveling to the Wild Onion Festival in Oklahoma with his storyteller uncle, Dynamite. While Chooch expresses the desire to become a chef, he feels pressure to follow the family tradition of storytelling before ultimately realizing he can do both. A boy named Saloli disobeys his mother and climbs a mountain in the second story, and Cherokee culture is discussed in the essay. A contributor to Kirkus Reviews noted that the book contained “three valuable expressions of Cherokee culture; sadly, the marquee story starts strong but ultimately fails to satisfy.”
In Look, Grandma!/ Ni, Elisi!, Coulson tells the story of a boy named Bo, who searches for containers to display the marbles he has made. He is finally old enough to sell his marbles alongside the crafts that his grandma, or elisi, has made. Elisi rejects Bo’s first container choices, but he finally finds on that meets her approval. “This fun, math-inspired story will empower children to keep trying until they succeed,” asserted a Kirkus Reviews writer.
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Kirkus Reviews, May 15, 2018, review of Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Defeated Army; October 15, 2020, review of The Reluctant Storyteller; July 1, 2021, review of Look, Grandma!/Ni, elisi!
School Library Journal, October, 2018, Myra Zarnowski, review of Unstoppable, p. 84.
ONLINE
Art Coulson website, https://artcoulson.com/ (April 27, 2022).
Cynthia Leitich Smith website, https://cynthialeitichsmith.com/ (November, 2018), Traci Sorell, author interview.
Indian Country Today, https://indiancountrytoday.com/ (October 14, 2021), Sandra Hale Schulman, author interview.
Raven Quill Literary Agency website, https://ravenliterary.com/ (April 27, 2022), author profile.
All About Art
A Navy brat, Art was born in Honolulu, where he lived for his first 7 months. Art and his family moved often, sometimes more than once a year. Art attended 14 different schools on three continents before he graduated high school.
Art’s first children’s book, The Creator’s Game, a story about a young lacrosse player, was published by the Minnesota Historical Society Press in 2013. Since then, he has published a number of other books and short stories for children. His most recent book, Look, Grandma! Ni, Elisi! was published in 2021 as part of Charlesbridge’s Storytelling Math series of picture books.
Before writing children’s books, Art was a writer and editor at magazines and newspapers all over the United States. After his journalism career, Art served as the first executive director of the Wilma Mankiller Foundation in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma.
Now, Art splits his time between his home in Minneapolis and his cabin in the Northwoods of Wisconsin.
Favorite city
Rome. Italy, not New York or Georgia
Favorite food
Grandma’s tacos
Favorite color
Blue, though Art is blue/green colorblind. So it might actually be green
First job
Paperboy for The Virginian-Pilot/Ledger-Star in Norfolk, Va.
Favorite job
Fry cook at Duff’s Smorgasbord
Number of states visited
49
States he still wants to visit
Oregon. Then Art will start to work his way through U.S. territories.
Favorite song
Brokedown Palace by the Grateful Dead
Enjoy it!
Favorite singer
Tom Waits
What? Even more music?
Favorite book
American Gods by Neil Gaiman, and Lexicon by Max Barry (tie)
Favorite movie
Trilogy of Terror (1975)
Favorite sport
Cherokee stickball
Favorite animal
Bigfoot
Musical instruments played
Trumpet, guitar, harmonica, piano (one song, really badly)
Languages spoken
English (fluently) and conversational French, Spanish, Italian, Ojibwe and Cherokee
Mac or PC?
Mac all the way since 1984
Art Coulson, Cherokee, was an award-winning journalist and the first executive director of the Wilma Mankiller Foundation in Oklahoma. His first children’s book, The Creator’s Game: A Story of Baaga’adowe/Lacrosse (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2013), told of the deep spiritual and cultural connections of American Indian people to the sport of lacrosse. Art still plays traditional Cherokee stickball, an original version of lacrosse, when he is visiting friends and family in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma. Art lives in Apple Valley, Minnesota, with his wife and two daughters.
Art Coulson (Cherokee) was born in Honolulu and spent his childhood years traveling the world as the son of a sailor. For 23 years, he worked as a daily journalist in cities across the United States and wrote an award-winning column about contemporary American Indian issues. After his journalism career, Art served as executive director of the Wilma Mankiller Foundation in Tahlequah, OK. A resident of the Twin Cities, Art frequently returns to the Cherokee Nation to visit with family, to play traditional stickball and to improve his knowledge of the Cherokee language.
Art Coulson is a writer of Cherokee, English and Dutch descent and comes from a family of storytellers. Some of his earliest memories are of listening to stories and reading books on his grandmother’s lap. He has been a writer his whole life and published his first two books when he was in elementary school (he was a self-publishing early adopter). Art served as the first executive director of the Wilma Mankiller Foundation in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma after an award-winning 25-year career in journalism. Art is the author of several books, including Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Beat Army (Capstone, 2018), The Reluctant Storyteller (Reycraft, 2020), and Look, Grandma! Ni, Elisi! (Charlesbridge, 2021). His short stories have appeared in anthologies from Benchmark and Heartdrum, an imprint of HarperCollins. His first middle grade novel, Chasing Bigfoot, will be published in spring 2022 by Reycraft. He lives in Minneapolis with his family. Art is repped by Jacqui Lipton.
Fun Fact: A Navy brat, Art traveled the world, attending 14 schools on 3 continents before graduating high school.
QUOTED: "I was actually writing books, or trying to write books, for adults at first. ... And the first children's book kind of dropped in my lap. Another writer had been approached by a publisher to write a nonfiction book about the connection of lacrosse to American Indian people. And she said: 'Well, I don't know anything about lacrosse, but I know a guy.' And I was the guy."
Cherokee author finds voice in award-winning children’s books
Writer Art Coulson draws stories from his family in Oklahoma
SANDRA HALE SCHULMANOCT 14, 2021
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his children's book, "The Reluctant Storyteller," about an Indigenous youth who resists his family tradition of storytelling. The book, published in late 2020, was illustrated by Carlin Bear Don't Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow. (Photo illustration courtesy of Reycraft Books)
Sandra Hale Schulman
Special to Indian Country Today
Art Coulson is anything but a reluctant storyteller.
A Cherokee Nation descendant from a family of storytellers, he published his first two picture books in a preschool program then went on to work more than 25 years in writing, editing and communications before finding his voice as a children’s author.
His 2020 book, “The Reluctant Storyteller,” has now been named one of the year’s top children’s books by the prestigious Bank Street and has been designated the American Indians in Children’s Literature Best Book of 2020.
Coulson also served as the first executive director of the Wilma Mankiller Foundation in Oklahoma, and plays lacrosse on the side.
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his children's books, including "The Reluctant Storyteller," about an Indigenous youth who resists his family tradition of storytelling. The book, published in late 2020, was illustrated by Carlin Bear Don't Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow. (Photo courtesy of Art Coulson)
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his children's book, including "The Reluctant Storyteller," about an Indigenous youth who resists his family tradition of storytelling. The book, published in late 2020, was illustrated by Carlin Bear Don't Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow. (Photo courtesy of Art Coulson)
“I was actually writing books, or trying to write books, for adults at first,” Coulson told Indian Country Today by phone from his home in Minneapolis, Minnesota. “And the first children's book kind of dropped in my lap. Another writer had been approached by a publisher to write a nonfiction book about the connection of lacrosse to American Indian people. And she said, ‘Well, I don't know anything about lacrosse, but I know a guy.’ And I was the guy.”
He’s now written 10 works for children and youths, including four books in a series on hunting and fishing, plus two graphic novels and a play. He wrote seven in just the last year while also working full-time for the Minnesota Department of Human Services.
His latest book, "Look, Grandma! Ni, Elisi!," was published this year as part of Charlesbridge’s Storytelling Math series of picture books. It is illustrated by Madelyn Goodnight.
“It may sound like a lot, but they’re short,” he said. “They’re short, chapter books.”
Crafting the story
Coulson has helped to shape the stories he tells. He made suggestions for the lacrosse book that converted it from a nonfiction book to a fictional tale about a young lacrosse player.
“I said, ‘You know, I play lacrosse and am from American Indians, but it really sounds kind of boring. Can I tell a fictional story that includes all the points that they want?’” he said. “And they were generous enough to make an offer on that book instead.”
He also convinced them to hire artist Robert DeJarlait, who provided the colorful illustrations for the book, The Creator’s Game, which was published in 2013.
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his children's book, "The Reluctant Storyteller," about an Indigenous youth who resists his family tradition of storytelling. The book, published in late 2020, was illustrated by Carlin Bear Don't Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow. (Photo courtesy of Reycraft Books)
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his children's book, "The Reluctant Storyteller," about an Indigenous youth who resists his family tradition of storytelling. The book, published in late 2020, was illustrated by Carlin Bear Don't Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow. (Photo courtesy of Reycraft Books)
The 48-page book was a success and led to a number of other books and short stories for children. His second book, “Unstoppable,” a story for middle-school-age students, tells the story of acclaimed Indigenous athlete Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian Industrial School football team’s big win over Army in 1912.
The Carlisle team was legendary, and the game came just a few months after Thorpe had won the gold medal in the pentathlon in the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm, Sweden. The book is illustrated by Nick Hardcastle.
“That was another case where a publisher approached me,” Coulson said. “And I thought, ‘This is a chance for me to learn a little bit more about Jim Thorpe…’ The other thing I really liked about it is they didn't want just a straight bio. They really wanted to focus on one specific football game and then the players who were in that game.”
A trip for Chooch
His third book, “The Reluctant Storyteller,” published last October by Reycraft Books, tells the story of teenager Chooch Tenkiller, who is reluctant to be a storyteller like the rest of his family and wants to be a chef.
“Everyone knew him as Chooch, which is what his mom and dad had called him from the day he was born,” Coulson writes in the book. “They said it meant “boy” in the language his grandparents had spoken back in Oklahoma.”
Then Chooch takes a trip with his Uncle Dynamite to the small town of Greasy, Oklahoma, where he learns that stories can be told in many ways.
The book includes vibrant illustrations by artist Carlin Bear Don’t Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow.
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his line of books for children and youths. His latest book, "Look, Grandma! Ni, Elisi!," released in 2021, is part of Charlesbridge’s Storytelling Math series of picture books. It is illustrated by Madelyn Goodnight. (Photo courtesy of Charlesbridge)
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his line of books for children and youths. His latest book, "Look, Grandma! Ni, Elisi!," released in 2021, is part of Charlesbridge’s Storytelling Math series of picture books. It is illustrated by Madelyn Goodnight. (Photo courtesy of Charlesbridge)
It’s an expanded version of an earlier book by Coulson that had been published for the educational market, and includes sections previously trimmed from the book.
The book includes a story Coulson had written earlier, “The Energy of the Thunder Beings,” with illustrations by Cherokee artist Roy Boney Jr., and a section about the modern Cherokee Nation by author Traci Sorell.
“I think it’s a really nice combination for your readers,” Coulson said in question-and-answer session posted online by the Raven Quill Literary Agency.
“A fictional story about a modern Cherokee boy, a story in the form of an old Cherokee tale that happened sometime in the distant past, and a nonfiction story about our people and community in Oklahoma.”
Finding his community
Coulson is now working on several books that will be published over the next two years, including a preschool picture book, a nonfiction graphic novel for middle-school-age youths and a full-length novel, “Chasing Bigfoot,” which will bring back Chooch and his uncles.
He is also working on books for the educational market while keeping his day job for the state. It forces him to be disciplined and pace himself, he said.
“What I generally try to do is usually after supper I get into my office and lock myself up and try to get 1,000 good words out,” he said. “I usually write from about eight o'clock at night, till about one or two in the morning. I've always been a night owl. I've worked at newspapers for 25 years. At night is when I'm my most productive...’
“I don't get 1,000 words in every day because sometimes there's administrative stuff to do, like answer emails,” he said. “Now that I have an agent I don't have to do as much of the paperwork kind of stuff.”
He also finds time to go fishing most evenings, which has helped him write his outdoors books. The graphic novels and play are also in the works.
“Last year, I got a chance to write a couple of graphic novels, which I've been wanting to do for a while,” he said. “One is largely done. The other one, I've got the edits back. And then the play that I did as a read-aloud play for schools — kids can take a different part and read the book, which is kind of fun to do because they're based on a true story of my childhood.”
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his children's book, "The Reluctant Storyteller," about an Indigenous youth who loves to cook but resists his family tradition of storytelling. The book, published in late 2020, was illustrated by Carlin Bear Don't Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow. (Photo illustration courtesy of Reycraft Books)
Cherokee author Art Coulson is winning acclaim for his children's book, "The Reluctant Storyteller," about an Indigenous youth who loves to cook but resists his family tradition of storytelling. The book, published in late 2020, was illustrated by Carlin Bear Don't Walk, Northern Cheyenne and Crow. (Photo illustration courtesy of Reycraft Books)
During the pandemic, he missed doing readings in-person for children, but had managed to do that virtually through the shutdown until recently, when he made a trip back to Oklahoma.
“I was down in Cherokee Nation and then in Pryor, Oklahoma, that's my grandmother's hometown,” he said. “I did all the schools in the district over the course of a week. Then when I got up to the upper end of the middle school and the high school, we talked more about writing and the writing life and that sort of thing. That was really fun to talk with the kids. They were really engaged and asked great questions.”
He enjoys the trips to Oklahoma after living a nomadic childhood as a Navy brat.
“I have a connection to the town because I grew up all over the world,” he said. “I never really had what I consider a home. We moved every year, at least once. So that was always the one place where we would see family.”
It has been key to finding his voice as an author.
“What’s really helped me as a children’s writer was finding my community,” Coulson said. "There are great, generous, smart Native children’s writers out there, creating great books. They are eager to help new writers connect and get established in the business.”
For more info
“The Reluctant Storyteller” is available on Amazon.com. Visit author Art Coulson’s webpage for more information about this book and others he has written.
QUOTED: "As an American Indian, I had a pretty good understanding of the importance of Jim Thorpe and knew the broad outlines of his story. I saw this book as a chance to learn more about him and about the other players on that Carlisle Indian School football team, many of them from tribal communities in my adopted home of Minnesota."
Native Voice: Art Coulson on Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Defeated Army
Home » Native Voice: Art Coulson on Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Defeated Army
Learn more about Art Coulson
By Traci Sorell
I’m delighted to feature author and former journalist Art Coulson today on Cynsations.
Fellow Cherokee Nation citizen and newcomer to the field of children’s literature like myself, Art has been busy writing and getting books published. Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Defeated Army, illustrated by Nick Hardcastle (Capstone, 2018) is his first picture book.
What was your initial inspiration for writing about Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle football team in Unstoppable?
Capstone actually came to me with the idea.
Because I had written a previous middle grade book about sports, The Creator’s Game: A Story of Baaga’adowe/Lacrosse, (illustrated by Robert DesJarlait (Minnesota Historical Society, 2013)), which explored the deep cultural roots of the sport of lacrosse in American Indian communities, Capstone asked me to tackle the Jim Thorpe book (ha! See what I did there? Tackle. Jim Thorpe. I crack myself up.).
At a Twin Cities signing for The Creator’s Game
Capstone wanted to focus on one particular college football game – Carlisle Indian School vs. West Point in 1912. This was a game that the press built up as a rematch of the Battle of Little Big Horn. Major newspapers, such as the New York Times, sent correspondents to cover the game.
Playing for Army that day were four future generals, one of them, Dwight Eisenhower, a future U.S. president.
Coaching the Carlisle Indians was the one and only Glenn “Pop” Warner. And the game came just after Jim Thorpe had won two gold medals at the 1912 Olympic Games in Sweden, where the Swedish king declared him “the greatest athlete in the world.”
Even though Carlisle was considered to have one of the top offenses in the country, they still came into the game against West Point as heavy underdogs – they only had 12 players suit up to play all offensive and defensive positions, the players were much smaller and their equipment was old and worn. But they had heart, intelligence and the greatest athlete in the world as their running back.
Spoiler alert: Carlisle creamed Army that day.
As an American Indian, I had a pretty good understanding of the importance of Jim Thorpe and knew the broad outlines of his story. I saw this book as a chance to learn more about him and about the other players on that Carlisle Indian School football team, many of them from tribal communities in my adopted home of Minnesota.
The other members of the Carlisle team went on to become pro athletes, war heroes, attorneys and leaders in their communities.
Yes, I have to say that I loved reading this story. And the back matter! Learning what the players did after they left Carlisle was a special treat I didn’t expect.
But given the import of the game and the phenomenal athlete and person that was Jim Thorpe, can you share some of the challenges (literary, research, psychological, logistical) you encountered in bringing the text to life?
Art at one of his first newspaper jobs
in suburban Washington, D.C.
Although I was a daily journalist for more than 20 years, I primarily write fiction these days.
Tackling a nonfiction project requires much more focused and detailed research (at least for me) than writing fiction.
That’s not to say that I don’t do research for my fictional works – only that having to provide sources and citations to Capstone’s fact-checkers for every fact and conversation in Unstoppable was challenging.
Thankfully, finding primary sources as I researched life at Carlisle, its football team and the game itself was made easier by the internet. Digitized archives of the Carlisle school newspaper offered a wealth of information and detail.
Another issue I faced was the amount of incorrect information available on the web, about Jim Thorpe, the Carlisle team and the game itself. Again, the primary sources were invaluable here.
It’s a cautionary tale for writers who rely on quick internet searches for research. Just because it’s on Wikipedia or someone’s blog doesn’t mean it’s actually true or correct.
Another challenge I faced in telling this story for young readers was finding a balance between the horror and immorality of the Indian boarding school system and the cases, like Jim Thorpe’s, in which a family chose to send a child to Haskell or Carlisle, perhaps seeing it as the only option for education available to them at the time.
That said, I did not want to minimize the atrocities at the boarding schools – thousands of our children were abused, maltreated and many died at these institutions, far from their homes and families.
You definitely had your work cut out for you because the boarding school experience for Native children is not like what most children think about boarding schools a’ la Hogwarts or some prep school in New England. Beyond this story, what is your relationship to the children’s-YA writing and illustration community? To the larger children’s-YA literature community?
I have many friends who are writers or illustrators, both here in the thriving Twin Cities literary community, and all across the nation. I participate in a group for male writers of color and American Indians who meet occasionally to discuss our roles in ending toxic masculinity in our communities.
Art, Marcie Rendon, Debbie Reese and Traci at Returning the Gift
Locally, I collaborate with a good friend, Marcie Rendon – we’re writing a book together! – and with noted writer and artist Robert DesJarlait, who illustrated The Creator’s Game (he’s the Lennon to my McCartney, to throw in an Eric Gansworth-worthy reference).
I also follow many other fellow writers on Twitter and Facebook so that I can support their work and keep up with trends in children’s and YA literature.
Art, Joe Bruchac and Tim Tingle at Returning the Gift.
Plus, I can’t fail to mention the many friends I made this year – my first – at the Kweli Color of Children’s Literature Conference in New York. That’s a great opportunity to meet other writers and to network with editors, publishers and agents in an intimate setting, allowing real conversation and connection.
As a Cherokee Nation citizen writing for children, what did your background and perspective bring to the story?
I came into the story with more than a passing knowledge of boarding schools, Carlisle in particular, and Jim Thorpe.
I also had personal experience with government-forced relocation. During the Termination era, my grandmother was taken by the government from her own family at a young age, with my infant mother on her lap, and moved to California, along with several of her brothers and sisters.
So I came into this book knowing firsthand the disruption and disconnection that results from having your family moved far from your extended family and your tribe.
Art teaching writing to American Indian Youth
As my grandmother often told me about her stories: “It doesn’t matter when it happened – it matters where it happened.”
Tearing us away from where our stories came to life was devastating.
Of course we made new stories, but we always mourned the ones we were forced to leave behind.
I think my experience early in life, living among Native people from many different nations in California, broadened my thinking on what it means to be American Indian and how much we share culturally as Native people. I also learned to recognize, appreciate and respect the differences between people of different nations.
What will we see next from you?
Like most writers, I’m working on a million different things at the moment. I already mentioned the book I’m working on with Marcie (a Native American romance!).
My next book, The Reluctant Storyteller, is due out in fall 2019 from Benchmark. It’s a middle grade book I’m really proud of. It’s about a young Cherokee boy, Chooch Tenkiller, who lives in the Twin Cities. His uncles and grandmother are renowned storytellers and travel the country to schools and festivals. Everyone assumes that he’s going to go into the “family business” of storytelling. But that’s not what Chooch wants (He wants to be a chef – like the guy on the ravioli can).
Right now, I’m working on a follow-up to that one – a chapter book about Chooch and his uncles, who get tangled up with a rival group of bigfoot hunters while on a storytelling trip to a college in the mountains of western North Carolina. That one doesn’t have a publisher yet (hint, hint if any publishers are reading this).
I’m also excited to be writing a short story for an upcoming anthology being edited by our very own Cynthia Leitich Smith. Word has it that Chooch and his uncles, Dynamite and Jack, will be making an appearance in that one as well. They do so love to travel.
Art Coulson at Cherokee National Holiday
Men’s Stickball Game
Cynsational Notes
Art Coulson is Cherokee from Oklahoma and comes from a family of storytellers.
Some of his earliest memories were of listening to stories and reading books on his grandmother’s lap. He has been a writer his whole life and published his first two books when he was in elementary school (he was a self-publishing early adopter).
A Navy brat, Art attended 14 different schools on three continents before he graduated high school.
Before writing children’s books, Art was a journalist at magazines and newspapers all over the United States.
After his newspaper career, Art served as the first executive director of The Wilma Mankiller Foundation in Oklahoma.
Now, Art lives in Minneapolis with his family, but still plays traditional Cherokee stickball, an original version of lacrosse, when he is visiting friends and relatives in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma several times a year.
Traci Sorell covers picture books as well as children’s-YA writing, illustration, publishing and other book news from Indigenous authors and illustrators for Cynsations. She is an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation.
We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga illustrated by Frané Lessac (Charlesbridge, 2018) is her first nonfiction picture book, an Orbis Pictus Honor Book and a 2018 Junior Library Guild Selection.
The story, which has received starred reviews from Kirkus and School Library Journal, features a panorama of modern-day Cherokee cultural practices and experiences, presented through the four seasons. It conveys a universal spirit of gratitude common in many cultures.
In fall 2019, her first fiction picture book, At the Mountain’s Base, illustrated by Weshoyot Alvitre will be published by Penguin Random House’s new imprint, Kokila.
Traci is represented by Emily Mitchell of Wernick & Pratt Literary Agency.
QUOTED: "a first choice for nonfiction picture book biography collections."
COULSON, Art. Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Defeated Army, illus. by Nick Hardcastle. 40p. further reading, glossary, notes, photos. Capstone. Aug. 2018. Tr $15.95. ISBN 9781543504064; pap. $7.95. ISBN 9781543504132.
Gr 1-5-In 1912, the Carlisle Indian School football team defeated Army, the U.S. Military Academy team at West Point. It was an exciting game, which pitted the quick, nimble players from Carlisle against the strong defense of the West Point Cadets. Detailed pen-and-ink and watercolor illustrations reveal the excitement of the Carlisle win and Jim Thorpe's athletic prowess, but also show the pain that Native children suffered when they were forced to attend boarding schools where the goal was to strip them of their culture--to change their dress and forbid them to speak their languages or practice their religion. The back matter reveals the more disturbing aspects of this true story--that many children died at the residential schools; that Thorpe had to give up the Olympic medals he won when officials learned that he had played professional baseball; and that Carlisle's famous coach, "Pop" Warner, was fired from Carlisle because of abusive behavior. This book shows that there is much to admire about Jim Thorpe and his career, without whitewashing history. VERDICT A first choice for nonfiction picture book biography collections.--Myra Zarnowski, City University of New York
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation
MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
Zarnowski, Myra. "COULSON, Art. Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Defeated Army." School Library Journal, vol. 64, no. 10, Oct. 2018, p. 84. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A556838480/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=8a06f3a0. Accessed 30 Mar. 2022.
QUOTED: "solid if incomplete."
Coulson, Art UNSTOPPABLE Capstone Young Readers (Children's Informational) $15.95 8, 1 ISBN: 978-1-5435-0406-4
The story of a wounded child who found refuge in sports.
As a child growing up in Indian Territory, Jim Thorpe (Sac and Fox) was taken from his family to Haskell Institute, a boarding school where Native children were forced into a white assimilation education system. After running away from Haskell several times, Jim was sent at 16 to the Carlisle Industrial School, where his father hoped he would learn a trade. Coulson's straightforward account informs readers that it was at Carlisle where Jim turned his talent for running to track, encouraged by coach Glenn "Pop" Warner. Though Jim was small for his age, he excelled in baseball, lacrosse, and hockey--and his ability to dodge bigger players landed him on Carlisle's varsity football team. The twin highlights of his career were making it to the 1912 Olympics, where he won several gold medals, and leading Carlisle to defeat the champion Army team. Hardcastle's fine-lined ink-and-watercolor illustrations project an appropriately bygone air, depicting Thorpe in motion more often than not. Though the book is a welcome celebration of this Native American sports hero, the text skates over the impacts of forced cultural assimilation and separation from his family on Jim. Coulson (Cherokee) does mention a more personal family history in the backmatter, as well as the stripping of Thorpe's Olympic medals (and their posthumous restoration), but his failure to integrate it into the story keeps readers from appreciating Jim's victories in their full scope.
Solid if incomplete. (glossary, further reading, notes) (Informational picture book. 6-10)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 Kirkus Media LLC
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"Coulson, Art: UNSTOPPABLE." Kirkus Reviews, 15 May 2018. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A538294027/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=67023747. Accessed 30 Mar. 2022.
QUOTED: "Three valuable expressions of Cherokee culture; sadly, the marquee story starts strong but ultimately fails to satisfy."
Coulson, Art THE RELUCTANT STORYTELLER Reycraft Books (Children's None) $16.95 10, 22 ISBN: 978-1-4788-7025-8
A novella, a short story, and an essay explore Cherokee present and past.
In Cherokee storyteller Coulson’s title novella, Maurice “Chooch” Tenkiller, a Minnesota middle schooler, is stuck accompanying his uncle Dynamite on a road trip to attend the Wild Onion Festival in Greasy, Oklahoma, to tell stories. The Tenkillers are a family of Cherokee storytellers, but Chooch has his heart set on becoming a chef. In the car, Dynamite tells a traditional story about a fox that wants to fly, suggesting that Chooch can pursue his own destiny. Indeed, upon arriving at the festival, surrounded by his extended family, Chooch learns that his gift of cooking is its own way of telling stories. Unfortunately, after 38 pages of careful character development, Chooch’s compelling story ends abruptly in two pages of epiphany and limp denouement, jarring readers out of their relationship with the protagonist. Bear Don’t Walk (Crow/Northern Cheyenne) crafts bold paintings that have the feel of snapshots, breathing life into the story. Coulson’s second tale, “The Energy of the Thunder Beings,” illustrated by Cherokee artist Boney, follows young Saloli, who ignores his mother’s advice and climbs the mountain called Standing Man in search of a new pair of sticks to play stickball, a quest that leads him to an encounter with the Little People. The book concludes with a brief showcase of contemporary Cherokee life and culture as explained by Cherokee author Sorell.
Three valuable expressions of Cherokee culture; sadly, the marquee story starts strong but ultimately fails to satisfy. (Anthology. 8-12)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2020 Kirkus Media LLC
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MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Coulson, Art: THE RELUCTANT STORYTELLER." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Oct. 2020. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A638165890/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=9140026a. Accessed 30 Mar. 2022.
QUOTED: "This fun, math-inspired story will empower children to keep trying until they succeed."
Coulson, Art LOOK, GRANDMA! NI, ELISI! Charlesbridge (Children's None) $15.99 8, 3 ISBN: 978-1-62354-203-0
Through investigation, Bo discovers the perfect container to display his marble collection at the Cherokee National Holiday festival.
For months, Bo has worked hard on painting round stones to make homemade marbles. He is finally old enough to sell them at his family’s craft booth. His grandma, Elisi, says there is only so much space at the table so he will need to find something to hold the marbles. She sends him to “look around. Just don’t make a big ol’ mess!” Bo hunts through the boxes in his room, but nothing is big enough. When he finds a large tray, Elisi says, “Tla.…Our booth is small. Your container needs to fit on this mat.” Bo carries the mat around the house, experimenting with containers of different shapes and sizes. He dumps out the contents of a ribbon box, a tool crate, and a tall vase, but nothing works. He is about to give up and ask for help when he empties the contents of a basket. His marbles fit perfectly! Elisi’s house is a mess, but Bo has found just the right container to show and sell his homemade marbles. Incorporating snatches of Cherokee, Coulson’s (Cherokee) tale conveys the challenges of estimating volume even as it develops three-dimensional characters and their affectionate relationship. Goodnight’s (Chickasaw) illustrations are lively and full of details specific to Cherokee culture.
This fun, math-inspired story will empower children to keep trying until they succeed. (author’s note, glossary, math activities) (Picture book. 3-6)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2021 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
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MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Coulson, Art: LOOK, GRANDMA! NI, ELISI!" Kirkus Reviews, 1 July 2021, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A667042246/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=1fac8c9c. Accessed 30 Mar. 2022.