The Art Thieves - by Andrea L Rogers (Hardcover)

About the Book

It's the year 2052. Stevie Henry is a Cherokee girl working at a museum in Texas, trying to save up enough money to go to college. The world around her is in a cycle of drought and superstorms, ice and fire, but people get by. But it's about to get a whole lot worse. When a mysterious boy shows up at Stevie's museum saying that he's from the future--and telling her what is to come--she refuses to believe him. But soon she will have no choice.

Book Synopsis

Shelf Awareness Best Book of 2024 - CCBC Choices 2025

TO: Angel Wilson (LawAngel@IBLO.gov)
FROM: Stevie Henry (shenry@gmail.com)
Thanks for coming to see me; but by the time you read this, it will be too late. No one will have started to panic, yet; but in less than two months nothing will be the same. What came first, The Chicken or the Egg Flu? I wish it mattered. But let's just say, maybe go back to wearing a mask, bathing in sanitizer, and avoid birds and eggs for a bit...

I did not kill my brother. I did quite the opposite, really.

It's the year 2052. Stevie Henry is a Cherokee girl working at a museum in Texas, trying to save up enough money to go to college. The world around her is in a cycle of drought and superstorms, ice and fire ... but people get by. But it's about to get a whole lot worse.

When a mysterious boy shows up at Stevie's museum saying that he's from the future -- and telling her what is to come -- she refuses to believe him. But soon she will have no choice.

From the author of the Walter Award-winning Man Made Monsters comes a YA novel that conjures our futures in startling life - the ones that we are headed towards, and the ones we can still work towards.

Review Quotes

"Compelling... the book's messages are ultimately about hope for the future, love despite despair, communal work toward positive change, and the redemptive power of art." - Horn Book

"A fierce apocalyptic time travel novel. This beautifully designed work of futurism, influenced by Octavia Butler, pushes back hard against the ills of our own world and embraces hope for the next, one built on cooperation and connection." - Booklist

"An exciting and intense plot combines with wonderfully realistic emotions as the story shifts from one of slow realization and acceptance to dystopia and uncertainty. Enchanting and full of darkly prescient social commentary; a Cherokee dystopia with Afrofuturistic inspiration." - School Library Journal

"Sharp social commentary folded into an all-too-believable dystopian setting." - Kirkus

"The book is a delight, full of action and lovable characters." --Kay Wosewick, Boswell Book Company, Milwaukee, WI

[STAR] "A stirring story about choosing to create a new future when disaster seems inevitable. Skillfully discusses the current affairs, pop culture, and climate-change related extreme weather events of the future and powerfully relates them to historical and contemporary legacies of racism and oppression... This provocative and insightful work of Cherokee futurism projects and imagines the kinds of decisions and personal sacrifices people might need to make to improve the world, and is an excellent choice for fans of Nnedi Okorafor or Octavia Butler. Award-winning author Andrea L. Rogers paints a stunning picture of what it means to hope for a better future and the strength it might take to make that future real."

-- Shelf-Awareness (starred)

[STAR] "Rogers employs smart and empathetic prose to present a realistically rendered science fiction tale that is at once adrenaline-pumping and emotionally moving. In this gripping adventure, Rogers considers the future of Indigenous heritage via an indomitable protagonist who, alongside a plethora of memorably realized characters, navigates tough issues relating to death, familial turmoil, exploitation, and climate collapse." - Publishers Weekly (starred)

[STAR] "Rogers has an impeccable eye for pacing. Hints of Cherokee culture are woven in among the sci-fi threads...providing a further anchor for Stevie in a world that feels less under her control all the time." - Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books (starred)

About the Author

Andrea L. Rogers is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation. She grew up in Tulsa, Oklahoma and graduated with an MFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe. Her picture book, Chooch Helped, was awarded the Caldecott Medal. Andrea's collection of horror stories, Man Made Monsters, received six starred reviews and won the Walter Dean Myers Award for Young Adult fiction. She is also the author of the YA novel The Art Thieves.

Author residence: Fayetteville, AR