a wonderful collection of tales divided into themes: tales of human creation - tales of world creation - tales of the sun, moon, and stars - monsters and monster slayers - war and the warrior code - tales of love and lust - trickster tales - stories of animals and other people - ghosts and the spirit world - visions of the end, these 166 stories outline native consciousness better than any non-fiction study. i've been reading them since 1990, but always haphazardly - just choosing one that interests, but this time i read it from cover to cover, and in doing so, was heartbroken to come to the end and read the stories concerned with the settler invasion and visions of the end of the world. it's good that these stories remain, they are signifiers of imagination, bravery, and a relationship to the natural world that is unparalleled.