Denver author David Heska Wanbli Weiden returns to the reservation with his second novel in a series

When David Heska Wanbli Weiden, Denver native and an enrolled citizen of the Sicangu Lakota Nation, came out with his debut novel “Winter Counts” in 2020, it was a sensation. The Native American crime novel scratched an itch that many readers didn’t even know they had, and the awards the book racked up proved it: Not only was it nominated for an Edgar Award for Best First Novel, it was also the winner of the Anthony, Thriller, Lefty, Barry, Macavity, Spur, High Plains, Tillie Olsen, CrimeFest (UK), Crime Fiction Lover (UK) Awards, as well as the Electa Quinney Award from the Association for the Study of American Indian Literatures. That’s a lot of accolades, especially for a first book.

Now Weiden is back with a sequel, “Wisdom Corner,” revisiting his main character Virgil Wounded Horse, a hired vigilante from the Rosebud Indian Reservation who’s desperately trying to escape a past that just won’t let him go. It’s not just crime fiction — it’s crime fiction meets a cultural survey of Native American life in a tumultuous modern world. Weiden will be debuting the book on Tuesday, July 7, at Tattered Cover Colfax, in conversation with award-winning local writer Erika Krouse. He’s also appearing at Old Firehouse Books on Thursday, July 9, with fellow author Carter Wilson, and has appearances in Durango, the Douglas County Library, Niwot, Lafayette, and other out-of-state locations throughout the summer. For an up-to-date list of his event schedule, see Weiden’s website.

The success of Winter Counts was part of the reason that it took six years for Weiden to come out with its sequel, the writing of which he says essentially started in 2023. “I was supremely lucky that the pandemic ended up being a positive thing for the novel,” he says. “That wasn’t true for a lot of books that came out around that time, but it did give people time to read, and ended up helping in terms of exposure.”

But he quickly adds that it was a double-edged sword. “I only got to go to one of the awards ceremonies,” he laughs. “Most were online, so I’d win an award and then turn off my computer and go back to real life, go get a Whopper from Burger King because we have a coupon.”

That’s changed now, with the post-pandemic world going back in most ways to in-person, but Weiden says the landscape for writers has been forever altered. “I think gone are the days of writers being able to write a book and then stand back and let a publisher handle the marketing and publicity,” says Weiden. “In many ways, that’s a good thing — I consider it an honor to meet readers everywhere from big public events to small Zoom book clubs.”

Despite “Wisdom Corner” taking six years to produce, Weiden says he wasn’t idle during the time when he was too busy with public appearances (or with his day job in academia — Weiden spent 11 years teaching at Metro State, and now serves as professor of English and Native American and Indigenous Studies at Stony Brook University, which allows him to still live here in Denver for part of the year). “When I was on flights or in a hotel lobby or just had a spare hour or two, I’d write short stories,” he recalls. “Since ‘Winter Counts,’ I published seven or eight stories. One of those was chosen for the Best American Mystery and Suspense Stories of 2022. So I was able to keep writing and stay sharp, even if it was tough to find time.”

Another story, “Sundays,” appeared in a collection called “Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology.” “That’s become a phenomenon,” says Weiden. “It was on the bestseller list for two years. And then I was just watching a Netflix show I like, ‘The Four Seasons,’ just a couple of weeks ago. One of the main characters is in bed with his partner, and he’s reading ‘Never Whistle at Night.’ Blew me away.” Weiden says that he’s considering a short story collection of his own as his next release, but those plans are still in early stages.

For now, Weiden is focused on continuing his examination of the world of legal and political issues regarding Native Americans. “In the first book, of course, I talked a lot about the Major Crimes Act, and how criminal activity is high on reservations because the FBI is not doing their job,” Weiden explains. “And that continues a bit in ‘Wisdom Corner,’ but there I add in the issue of Native American boarding schools. Something like 70% of all Native American children from the late 1880s to about the 1930s were taken without consent from their parents and sent to these schools where they were often physically and sexually abused. That’s becoming a little more well-known, but what still isn’t being written about is the aftermath of all that. When most of the schools closed, their influence remained, and that’s what I bring into this second book.”

One of the old saws of publishing is that a lot of writers with a big first book will encounter a sophomore slump of sorts. Weiden says he totally understands that risk. “You spend a lot of time, possibly your whole life, preparing for book one,” he says. “You throw in everything. I certainly did. And that first book exceeded my expectations wildly. But then comes book two, which you have to crank out in a much tighter time frame. I struggled with that for a bit until I told myself to just write the book I wanted to write. I think in a lot of ways, it completes the arc for Virgil Wounded Horse.”

So is “Wisdom Corner” the last hurrah for Weiden’s beloved protagonist? Probably not, Weiden says. “For right now, I’m happy to try something else. I’ve written two novels in first person, plus five or six short stories with him as the main character. That’s about 700 pages of being in his head.” Weiden laughs. “But still, I love that character. He’s so fascinating to me that I’m totally open to another book.”

David Heska Wanbli Weiden debuts “Wisdom Corner” on Tuesday, July 7, at Tattered Cover Colfax, in conversation with award-winning local writer Erika Krouse, and on Thursday, July 9, at Old Firehouse Books in Fort Collins with author Carter Wilson. For details on those events and other upcoming appearances, see Weiden’s website.