The Ojibwe novelist and historian David Treuer’s most recent book is addressed to his “kiddos.” In The Savage Mind: An American Legacy (Little, Brown; Oct. 6), he writes, “Your countrymen point at us and the places we live from over the walls that guard the so-called civilized world and say we’re dangerous, savage, wild. And we — those of us who live on reservations or the ‘inner city’ and other so-called savage places — point over the wall in the other direction toward the police, the government, Apple Inc. or X or whatever and say the same thing. But we’re all wrong.” In the essay collection, Treuer posits that “the problem is not out there so much as it is within all of us.” Our starred review calls the book “an often grim, always provocative study of the contradictions that shape our lives—for better, but more often for worse.” Treuer answered our questions by email.

What was the original idea that started you working on the book?

In 2015, there was a mass shooting quite near where I lived with my children in California. And, in quick succession, there were more shootings and rituals of public violence. They seemed to be happening everywhere. There seemed to be something wrong with the country, with its very fabric. The story America told to itself about itself was increasingly dark. Writing is, for me, a way of thinking, of ordering thought to expand my understanding and to understand myself. So, I sat down to write it out.

How did you decide to address the book to your children?

The whole book is a letter to my children: begun when they were kids and now completed when they have mostly grown. It’s my shortest book, but it has taken the longest to write. My self-concern is a settled matter, but my concern for my kids (and this includes my nieces and nephews) is ever evolving. They, ultimately, will inherit the world made by me, and so it’s to them the book is addressed.

Were there authors who inspired you in working on the book?

Writing is a complicated thing: On the one hand, we inherit traditions, and everything we write exists in relation to what has come before, going back to Homer. On the other hand, writers try to erase their own tracks, so their work seems to be a singular kind of virgin birth. I’ve done away with the second hand, and it’s quite clear I am joining, and moving forward, a tradition of writing and thought that started in the African American vernacular, was perfected by James Baldwin, and perfected again by Ta-Nehisi Coates. I very consciously am trying to join that tradition and push the conversation and thought further down the road.

What was most challenging about writing the book? And most rewarding?

All of it was challenging! It was both rewarding and difficult to give shape to an almost overwhelming fear (for my life, my children’s lives, and the life of the country) and to find in it some kind of solution, if not some species of hope.

What book or books published in 2026 were among your favorites?

The Message—Ta-Nehisi Coates. Angel Down—Daniel Kraus. Memed, My Hawk—Yashar Kemel. Medicine River—Mary Annette Pember. I know none of these were published in 2026! But as a writer, professor, book editor, and father, I don’t always get to read for pleasure, and when I do it is often delayed by years or even decades, alas.

John McMurtrie is the nonfiction editor.