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Nínááníbaa' #1
Her Land, Her Love
The first novel, in a sweeping epic of one determined Navajo family's efforts to persevere during the Long Walk, blends history, romance, conflict, culture, and family in a finely crafted story that is a true work of passion. The first authentic Navajo love story, with Navajo values of love, relationships, and community.
The story begins in Black Mesa, Arizona in 1865 at the start of the Navajo Long Walk. The woman at the heart of the story is Ninaanibaa' (The Woman Warrior who Came Home Once Again) and her husband, Hashke Yil Naabaah (The Warrior Who Fights with Anger). When two of their daughters are kidnapped, they set out on a journey in search of their missing children.
The story begins in Black Mesa, Arizona in 1865 at the start of the Navajo Long Walk. The woman at the heart of the story is Ninaanibaa' (The Woman Warrior who Came Home Once Again) and her husband, Hashke Yil Naabaah (The Warrior Who Fights with Anger). When two of their daughters are kidnapped, they set out on a journey in search of their missing children.
418 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2014
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478 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
July 28, 2021
Actual Rating: 3.5 stars
Her Land, Her Love is part love story, part family saga, part novelization of the Long Walk and the horrors experienced by Navajo people and other Indigenous people. This book takes awhile to get into and has what feels like an arms-length, formal writing style until you get to know the characters. But then it's like a gut punch interrupted by moments of tenderness and love. This was difficult to read at times, but I do think it's important to be aware of this history.
We see our heroine grow up in an idyllic community, get married, fall in love with her husband, have babies, begin raising a family, and then... Everything is rudely interrupted when her two daughters are abducted and she will do anything to find them again. There's a lot of love and strength in this story, but there are also a lot of horrific things. From attempted sexual assault on the main character, repeated mentions of the same against women and girls by white soldiers, verbal and physical abuse, horrific living conditions, and much more. It can be a lot. And maybe I should have known but I don't think I realized just how bad things were.
But as much as this does not shy away from abuse and deprivation, it is also a story filled with hope, the strength of love, community, and the value of Navajo beliefs and practices to the characters. It's clear this was written primarily for a Navajo audience. Throughout the book the Navajo language is used, sometimes in blocks of text, directly followed by the English translation. It's cool but it does take some getting used to. And I think that's the main thing with this book. While I found much of it to be deeply affecting and I learned a lot, it's also written in a style that makes you always aware that the author is telling you the story, and has a tendency toward lengthy descriptions and loosely related side bars that don't move the story forward, but rather feel like an instructional text for Navajo youth. And none of that is necessarily bad, especially given who this was written for, but it does mean that other audiences will need to work a little harder with this one. I will say, I thought the relationship between the main characters was BEAUTIFUL and there were moments that nearly brought me to tears. Talk about commitment to each other in a marriage no matter what life throws at you.
Her Land, Her Love is part love story, part family saga, part novelization of the Long Walk and the horrors experienced by Navajo people and other Indigenous people. This book takes awhile to get into and has what feels like an arms-length, formal writing style until you get to know the characters. But then it's like a gut punch interrupted by moments of tenderness and love. This was difficult to read at times, but I do think it's important to be aware of this history.
We see our heroine grow up in an idyllic community, get married, fall in love with her husband, have babies, begin raising a family, and then... Everything is rudely interrupted when her two daughters are abducted and she will do anything to find them again. There's a lot of love and strength in this story, but there are also a lot of horrific things. From attempted sexual assault on the main character, repeated mentions of the same against women and girls by white soldiers, verbal and physical abuse, horrific living conditions, and much more. It can be a lot. And maybe I should have known but I don't think I realized just how bad things were.
But as much as this does not shy away from abuse and deprivation, it is also a story filled with hope, the strength of love, community, and the value of Navajo beliefs and practices to the characters. It's clear this was written primarily for a Navajo audience. Throughout the book the Navajo language is used, sometimes in blocks of text, directly followed by the English translation. It's cool but it does take some getting used to. And I think that's the main thing with this book. While I found much of it to be deeply affecting and I learned a lot, it's also written in a style that makes you always aware that the author is telling you the story, and has a tendency toward lengthy descriptions and loosely related side bars that don't move the story forward, but rather feel like an instructional text for Navajo youth. And none of that is necessarily bad, especially given who this was written for, but it does mean that other audiences will need to work a little harder with this one. I will say, I thought the relationship between the main characters was BEAUTIFUL and there were moments that nearly brought me to tears. Talk about commitment to each other in a marriage no matter what life throws at you.
November 11, 2021
This was so beautiful and so emotional and I will never recover. Ten billion stars. Also, I can't recommend the audiobook enough, it's free on the publisher's website and it's so worth it. I can't wait to own this book and the rest of the series physically.
P. S. Hashké Yił Naabaah deserves the title of the best book man in existence. I LOVE HIM SO MUCH.
P. S. Hashké Yił Naabaah deserves the title of the best book man in existence. I LOVE HIM SO MUCH.
August 1, 2021
While this book wasn't bad, it was just a lot for me to handle emotionally/mentally.
There are multiple moments of rape, sexual assault, sexual abuse, abuse, violence, death, and I would've really appreciated a trigger warning or something.
If you go into this, just be aware of the historical events surrounding the long walk, because this was a lot for me to handle.
While this was deeply emotional, I really loved the relationship between the mother and father, their dedication to each other and them wanting to reunite their family.
There are multiple moments of rape, sexual assault, sexual abuse, abuse, violence, death, and I would've really appreciated a trigger warning or something.
If you go into this, just be aware of the historical events surrounding the long walk, because this was a lot for me to handle.
While this was deeply emotional, I really loved the relationship between the mother and father, their dedication to each other and them wanting to reunite their family.
November 12, 2019
Her Land, Her Love is a fictionalized telling of the Navajo Long Walk, told from the perspective of one Navajo couple, their family, and their people. It's a long book that was sometimes on the slow side for me, but other times fast. I would be reading along wondering when I'd get to the end of a chapter, but by the time I got there I would be hooked and just keep right on reading into the next chapter. I found it fascinating to see what life was like for these characters- their skill at living off of the land, and also the intensity of the horrors they endured when their lives were so disrupted by the U.S. army.
Though somewhat long, I will note that there is a good amount of text that is in the/a Navajo language and then translated to English, and I was able to skip over quite a bit and just read the English. I may have learned a few new words, though, with barely any effort!
I read this book for the 2019 Read Harder Challenge- the task to read an historical romance by an author of color. I would like to read more in the series.
Though somewhat long, I will note that there is a good amount of text that is in the/a Navajo language and then translated to English, and I was able to skip over quite a bit and just read the English. I may have learned a few new words, though, with barely any effort!
I read this book for the 2019 Read Harder Challenge- the task to read an historical romance by an author of color. I would like to read more in the series.
March 27, 2025
3 sentence summary: In Black Mesa, AZ where the Navajo live, a daughter is born into a loving family and her marriage with a War leader is arranged. After Ninaanibaa and Hashke wed, they grow their own family until one day their daughters are kidnapped by the white men and the Navajo peoples are being forcibly removed from their land. This epic love saga follows Ninaanibaa and Hashke over multiple years as they depend on each other, are forced on the Navajo long walk, and never give up looking for their daughters.
I read this entire book on a cross-country flight and almost cried on the plane multiple times. It was that good.
Her Land, Her Love is the only historical romance I’ve found that is centered on Native American MCs and written by a Native author. It’s powerful because the author wrote it as a love letter to her Navajo tribe, using fiction to tell the traumatic story of the Navajo long walk, a real historical event where the Navajo people were forced to walk from Arizona to New Mexico circa 1865. Given the setting, there are many horrific moments captured in this book, so please check the CWs. However, instead of focusing only on the atrocities, Yazzie wrote a love story.
Love persisting in the midst of hardship, of settler colonial violence, of land theft is more than powerful. It’s revolutionary. The love between Ninaanibaa and Hashke proves this. They are wed in an arranged marriage early in the book and while their commitment to their family and tribe is important, it is their love that drives the story and holds the pieces together when everything falls apart. This book is a love saga.
Aside from the love between Ninaanibaa and Hashke, my favorite part of Her Land, Her Love was the Navajo culture woven throughout. I appreciated how the dialogue was first written in Navajo and then translated in English.
I think everyone who reads HR should read Her Land, Her Love. It’s unlike any other book I’ve read and will stay with me for years to come.
CWs: Child death, settler colonialism, imprisonment, kidnapping, rape and sexual assault
Overall rating: 5 stars
Spicy rating: 1
I read this entire book on a cross-country flight and almost cried on the plane multiple times. It was that good.
Her Land, Her Love is the only historical romance I’ve found that is centered on Native American MCs and written by a Native author. It’s powerful because the author wrote it as a love letter to her Navajo tribe, using fiction to tell the traumatic story of the Navajo long walk, a real historical event where the Navajo people were forced to walk from Arizona to New Mexico circa 1865. Given the setting, there are many horrific moments captured in this book, so please check the CWs. However, instead of focusing only on the atrocities, Yazzie wrote a love story.
Love persisting in the midst of hardship, of settler colonial violence, of land theft is more than powerful. It’s revolutionary. The love between Ninaanibaa and Hashke proves this. They are wed in an arranged marriage early in the book and while their commitment to their family and tribe is important, it is their love that drives the story and holds the pieces together when everything falls apart. This book is a love saga.
Aside from the love between Ninaanibaa and Hashke, my favorite part of Her Land, Her Love was the Navajo culture woven throughout. I appreciated how the dialogue was first written in Navajo and then translated in English.
I think everyone who reads HR should read Her Land, Her Love. It’s unlike any other book I’ve read and will stay with me for years to come.
CWs: Child death, settler colonialism, imprisonment, kidnapping, rape and sexual assault
Overall rating: 5 stars
Spicy rating: 1
February 4, 2025
I decided on 4 stars. Edited 2/3/25: 5 stars. It's still sitting with me.
I was very moved throughout reading this. It was written very much like an oral history, which was both fitting and easy to follow. Even though my people's history is a different one, I found myself crying easily and often at the overlaps. There is a lot of importance in history being preserved in this fashion--the choice for it to be a fictional love story also worked very well and added hope and tenderness to a painful topic.
As it is a painful topic, it also delves into some graphic descriptions, but these events are real even if this is a fictionalization of it, and I think it does a disservice to what happened to want that sanitized out of the novel. It speaks of what it needs to. Parts of it are terrifying and unsettling and it is meant to be. You are not meant to be comfortable with the kinds of horrors that happened in these events. If my own people's forced travel was to be similarly written about, I would not want the horrors it to be shied away. Their suffering deserves to be recognized. I don't think it delved into being exploitative (which some things that discuss suffering can be). I would warn people interested in it it does discuss rape, torture, kidnapping, death, etc, but that's because this historical event also deals with these topics.
I was very moved throughout reading this. It was written very much like an oral history, which was both fitting and easy to follow. Even though my people's history is a different one, I found myself crying easily and often at the overlaps. There is a lot of importance in history being preserved in this fashion--the choice for it to be a fictional love story also worked very well and added hope and tenderness to a painful topic.
As it is a painful topic, it also delves into some graphic descriptions, but these events are real even if this is a fictionalization of it, and I think it does a disservice to what happened to want that sanitized out of the novel. It speaks of what it needs to. Parts of it are terrifying and unsettling and it is meant to be. You are not meant to be comfortable with the kinds of horrors that happened in these events. If my own people's forced travel was to be similarly written about, I would not want the horrors it to be shied away. Their suffering deserves to be recognized. I don't think it delved into being exploitative (which some things that discuss suffering can be). I would warn people interested in it it does discuss rape, torture, kidnapping, death, etc, but that's because this historical event also deals with these topics.
November 14, 2014
Yazzie provides a Navajo perspective of the people’s poignant event in history, which the novel is set in the midst of the Long Walk. The author eloquently intertwines the retelling of oral history of the Navajo elder’s experiences of strength and survival during the Long Walk through Ninaanibaa and her husband Hashké Yił Naabaah. The young couple not only struggles to protect their family, but also their tribal community. The novel truly displays the Navajo cultural perspective of family, love, strength, and belief, which is overlooked from other historical book written about the Long Walk.
September 19, 2024
Okay, so there's a story behind why I bought and read this book. I was traveling through the Southwest and I saw it on the shelves of the gift shop of the Navajo National Monument National Park. It looked like a cheesy romance with all of the marks of self-publication - bad layout, heavy paper weight, poor font choice. I thought it was expensive for a paperback so I didn't buy it.
About an hour later on the road I realized I made a mistake. As someone who works in publishing, I'm on the lookout for overlooked authors and literature. I then continued on my roadtrip and not only did I search every gift shop at every national park over several states but also several used bookstores specializing in indigenous literature, and none of them had it. When I got home, I called the National Monument center - which is very small - and asked the receptionist if she could tell me the name of the author of the romance books that were on the wall across from her desk, and she did. I went online and discovered that the author was deceased, so I bought this book used on Amazon rather than new on Amazon.
The book is definitely so-so. The small press that published it doesn't normally handle historical fiction, which is what it is, despite the cheesy title and romance cover. I could see why an editor at a bigger company would have passed on it. It's very repetitive, which a very black-and-white view of the universe and its characters. It definitely would have been edited down by about a fourth by a professional editor. That said, it is extremely authentic writing. The author - who is obviously Navajo, sets the book during the Long Walk (which I admit I had to google), and she based it loosely on real stories she heard as a child from her grandmother, who survived the Long Walk. The dialogue is in Navajo with English translations. She definitely has a culturally-important story to tell, so I'm glad I read it, but you should go into it knowing the prose isn't that great.
About an hour later on the road I realized I made a mistake. As someone who works in publishing, I'm on the lookout for overlooked authors and literature. I then continued on my roadtrip and not only did I search every gift shop at every national park over several states but also several used bookstores specializing in indigenous literature, and none of them had it. When I got home, I called the National Monument center - which is very small - and asked the receptionist if she could tell me the name of the author of the romance books that were on the wall across from her desk, and she did. I went online and discovered that the author was deceased, so I bought this book used on Amazon rather than new on Amazon.
The book is definitely so-so. The small press that published it doesn't normally handle historical fiction, which is what it is, despite the cheesy title and romance cover. I could see why an editor at a bigger company would have passed on it. It's very repetitive, which a very black-and-white view of the universe and its characters. It definitely would have been edited down by about a fourth by a professional editor. That said, it is extremely authentic writing. The author - who is obviously Navajo, sets the book during the Long Walk (which I admit I had to google), and she based it loosely on real stories she heard as a child from her grandmother, who survived the Long Walk. The dialogue is in Navajo with English translations. She definitely has a culturally-important story to tell, so I'm glad I read it, but you should go into it knowing the prose isn't that great.
May 18, 2025
"Her Land, Her Love" by Evangeline Parsons Yazzie this book is good for young adults and adults. This book has a lot of adventure, risk taking, horror, and taking action.
This book is about a young girl who tells us how her life went during the long walk. The first events that go on where she started her woman hood, then how she got married. Then how main events started to occur while she had lost some family members. She also tells how the other navajos felt, and how they would try to keep other safe and strong. After they went through so much walking for days had no food no water for 4 years straight they finally went home to their home land.
This book had gave me a lot of information about how the long was and how people felt during that time. The harsh things they went through and the good things that came out from that. Even though this book is not real this still gives a good information about what happen a long time ago.
This book is about a young girl who tells us how her life went during the long walk. The first events that go on where she started her woman hood, then how she got married. Then how main events started to occur while she had lost some family members. She also tells how the other navajos felt, and how they would try to keep other safe and strong. After they went through so much walking for days had no food no water for 4 years straight they finally went home to their home land.
This book had gave me a lot of information about how the long was and how people felt during that time. The harsh things they went through and the good things that came out from that. Even though this book is not real this still gives a good information about what happen a long time ago.
May 20, 2025
Her Land, Her Love is an interesting book to read and how that you may learn about how the long walk happened and it also talks about how they were sent to Fort Sumner and it talks about the language that we speak and how that it talks about the treaty years of 1864 because over the years, and there was also a rule that if the navajos dont obey the rules that the soldiers gave to them and not knowing that if some navajos are left behind or they are sick, the soldiers would kill the navajos that are sick or that are to weak to keep going, and it also talks about a girl named Ninaabah and her girls, and that her girls were taken by the mexicans and they were keeping them hostages for awhile and ninaabah would cry for them or anything that has remained her of them.
January 17, 2023
I love historical fiction books, and this is a great example of why. This book has helped me learn a lot about history connecting to the Navajo history while also being informative. It follows a family trying to survive the events of European settlers. The book has details that will keep you inclined to read every page, and there are a lot of thrilling parts in the book. It is also really interesting in the way it shows a truth not all might be willing to accept. Overall this book was really interesting and entertaining. I would recommend this great novel to anyone that likes historical fiction, or is just looking for something to keep you captivated.
April 23, 2018
This book gave me mixed emotions and I was not sure how I felt about this book. It was confusing for me to understand what the author was getting at while reading this. The theme of this book was about peace and harmony. This book gave students a sense of different cultures and history. Once I had a better understanding of the book, it was difficult for me to put it down!
October 2, 2024
Her Land her Love is an amazing book with crazy plot twists and challenges. I also love how the family stays together and is always their for each other. If you love Native culture this book is for you and definitely recommend.
December 28, 2022
Deeply emotional historical fiction novel about the Navajo Longwalk.
Recommend to anyone willing to learn more about the history of Indigenous people.
Recommend to anyone willing to learn more about the history of Indigenous people.
February 14, 2024
Loved learning more about the Najavo people and their history. Story rating 4, writing style 3.
February 27, 2023
The way the author Evangeline Parsons Yazzie writes the story is she uses verbal stories that were passed down from generations. What I liked about the book was even though I couldn't understand some of the Navajo vocabulary used in the book I like how she translated what she wrote in Navajo. I also liked that even though this is not apart of my immediate family's (clan) history the story is relatable to other Navajo families from that area. I liked how the book wasn't a history book instead it was relatable to today's Navajo families who are mostly a matriarchal society. I liked how the author included the map because I can visualize what shes talking about like the sand, mesas, and land because I am familiar with the area. When reading the book it places me back to my childhood at my grandma's house. Now that my great grandparents are gone I can't ask them questions about our Navajo history, but reading this book helps me to better understand the Navajo history. I think the book really shows the resilience and strength of Navajo People, mainly Navajo Women. What I didn't like was how the book was very descriptive in some parts and how their first child was conceived. I didn't like how it made me feel emotional it made me feel sad, angry and wanting to cry because it made me picture how my great grandparents and Navajo leaders were treated by the soldiers with disrespect. It was also hard for me to continue reading this book because it was hard to follow in the beginning in the first 3 chapters. The author's main audience was native youth, I believe she did accomplished her target audience. I would not just recommend this book to my fellow peers but also to people who want to know about the Navajo people and their history.
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February 4, 2022
Trigger & Content Warnings
Rape
Sexual assault
Rape
Sexual assault
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