Even As we Breathe
Nineteen-year-old Cowney Sequoyah yearns to escape his hometown of Cherokee, North Carolina, in the heart of the Smoky Mountains. When a summer job at Asheville’s luxurious Grove Park Inn and Resort brings him one step closer to escaping the hills that both cradle and suffocate him, he sees it as an opportunity. Learn More…
Paperback Available
Paperback Available
The University Press of Kentucky releases Even As We Breathe in paperback. Order
In The News
Write On, Mississippi - Story Made Podcast
Write On, Mississippi: Season 6, Chapter 1: Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle
•Thursday, September 14, 2023
Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle discusses her debut novel, Even As We Breathe, with her friend and fellow North Carolinian, Matt Sawyer. The book made Clapsaddle the first member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians to publish a novel.
PBS: Southern Storytellers
Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle is the author of "Even As We Breathe" and a citizen of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. Annette takes author David Joy ("Those We Thought We Knew") to Kituwah Mound, the "most sacred place for the Cherokee."
NPR
“The ancestral home of the Cherokee people sprawls across western North Carolina, a mountainous region thick with yellow birch and red maple forests, Dollar Generals, and ancient ceremonial mounds dating back to at least 1000 BCE. It's also home to first-time author Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle.”
The Bitter Southerner
“Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle’s Even As We Breathe is the story of a young Cherokee man setting out in the world and discovering that he might realize his full potential through returning home to North Carolina. Behind that story is the story of a debut author — the first enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians to publish a novel — who did much the same.”
Our State Magazine
“A Q&A with author Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle, the first member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians to publish a novel.”
Publishers Weekly
“Both an astonishing addition to WWII and Native American literature, this novel sings on every level.”