Join Heyday author Greg Sarris at the Center for Fiction, taking part in the panel “Indigenous Narratives of the Past, Present, and Future.” This event is ticketed.

Long before the first Europeans set foot on Turtle Island, Indigenous people shared and recorded their stories and histories. In a conversation moderated by scholar Joseph M. Pierce (Cherokee), novelists Eliana Ramage (Cherokee) and Greg Sarris (Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria), along with historian Linford D. Fisher, will consider Native literature from cultural, anthropological, and fictional perspectives. As many commemorate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the authors will offer a clear-eyed examination of America’s past while celebrating Indigenous presents and futures.

This panel will bring together Fisher’s rich account of the long history of Indigenous enslavement and land dispossession; Ramage’s and Sarris’s fictional depictions of a Depression-era shape-shifter and a modern-day aspiring Cherokee astronaut, respectively; and Pierce’s theorization of future worlds and imaginaries that illuminate Indigenous thought and practice. A book signing will follow the event.

Greg Sarris is an accomplished author, university professor, and tribal leader currently serving his seventeenth term as Chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria. His publications include Keeping Slug Woman Alive, Grand Avenue, Watermelon Nights, How a Mountain Was Made, Becoming Story, and The Forgetters. In June 2026 his new novel, The Last Human Bear, will debut. He is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the Board of Trustees of the Sundance Institute, former board chair of the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian, and a member of the Board of Regents for the University of California. Greg lives and works in Sonoma County, California. Visit his website at greg-sarris.com.