Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle

Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle, an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI) resides in Qualla, North Carolina, with her husband, Evan, and their sons, Ross and Charlie. She holds degrees from Yale University and the College of William and Mary. Her first novel, Going to Water, is winner of the Morning Star Award for Creative Writing from the Native American Literature Symposium (2012), a finalist for the PEN/Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction (2014), and the 2017−2018 selection for Western Carolina University’s One Book program. Recent publications also include “Undertow” in Carolina Mountain Literary Festival Anthology: Ten Years of Festivals (Press 53, 2015), Naked Came the Leaf Peeper(Burning Bush Press, 2011), “It All Comes Out in the Wash” from Appalachian Heritage Quarterly (Berea College, 2009), and “Camouflage” from Night is Gone, Day Is Still Coming (Candlewick Press, 2003), and a series of bilingual children’s books published by the EBCI. After serving as executive director of the Cherokee Preservation Foundation, Annette (National Board Certified since 2012) returned to teaching English at Swain County High School. She is coeditor of the Journal of Cherokee Studies and writes bimonthly columns for Smoky Mountain Living magazine.