Amber McCrary at Blue Corn Festival in Phoenix

Date: Saturday, March 1, 2025

Time: 12-5 p.m., MST

Where: Arizona Humanities House, 1242 N Central Ave., Phoenix, AZ

Celebrate the NDN Girls Book Club Blue Corn Festival with Amber McCrary, author of Blue Corn Tongue: Poems in the Mouth of the Desert. The Arizona Humanities House hosts the event which includes readings by Amber McCrary, Laura Tohe, author of Tséyi’ / Deep in the Rock, Alana Yazzie, and Kinsale Drake. This celebration of Diné culture, literature, and futures also features jewelry and food. The event is free and open to the public and is sponsored by the Arizona Arts Commission and Palabras Bookstore.

About the book:

In a voice that is jubilant, irreverent, sometimes scouring, sometimes heartfelt, and always unmistakably her own, Amber McCrary remaps the deserts of Arizona through the blue corn story of a young Diné woman figuring out love and life with an O’odham man. Reflecting experiences of Indigenous joy, pain, and family, these shapeshifting poems celebrate the love between two Native partners, a love that flourishes alongside the traumas they face in the present and the past. From her ethereal connection with her saguaro muse, Hosh, to the intricate tapestry of her relationships with Diné relatives and her awakening to the complex world of toxic masculinity, McCrary brings together DIY zine aesthetics, life forms of juniper and mountains, and the beauty of Diné Bizaad to tell of the enduring bonds between people and place.