Marcie Rendon

Marcie Rendon
Marcie Rendon
Marcie Rendon at the 2022 Texas Book Festival
Born1952 (age 73–74)
EducationMoorhead State University (BA)
Saint Mary's University of Minnesota (MA)
Occupations
  • Playwright
  • poet
  • writer
Writing career
LanguageEnglish
GenresJuvenile nonfiction, crime fiction
Notable awardsMcKnight Foundation's Distinguished Artist Award (2020)
Websitemarcierendon.com

Marcie Rendon (born 1952) is a Native American playwright, poet, author, and community arts activist based in Minneapolis. She is an enrolled member of the White Earth Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe.

Rendon founded Raving Native Productions theater. Along with various plays, screenplays, poems, and short stories, she has written two nonfiction books for children and five crime fiction novels. Her first novel Murder on the Red River won the 2018 Pinckley Prize for Debut Crime Fiction. Her second novel Girl Gone Missing was shortlisted for the 2020 G. P. Putnam's Sons Sue Grafton Memorial Award. Her most well-known theatre work is Free Frybread, a mock telethon play which satirizes the American prison system and its treatment of Native Americans.

Early life and education

Rendon was born in Norman County, Minnesota in 1952.

Rendon graduated from Moorhead State University in 1975 with two Bachelor of Arts degrees, in criminal justice and Indian studies. In 1991 she graduated with a Master of Arts in human development from Saint Mary's University of Minnesota.

Career

In the early 1990s, Rendon won the Loft’s Inroads Writers of Color Award and was mentored by Anishinaabe writer Jim Northrup. She founded Raving Native Productions in 1996.

In 2016, Rendon received the Loft's Spoken Word Immersion fellowship. In 2017, her poetry appeared in the Saint Paul Almanac's Impressions project.

In June 2019, Rendon was featured in Visual Collaborative's Polaris catalogue as part of the Voyager series for humanities. Rendon was the first Native American woman to receive the McKnight Foundation's 2020 Distinguished Artist Award.

Awards and honors

Works

Children's nonfiction

  • Powwow Summer: A Family Celebrates the Circle of Life (1996, Carolrhoda Books)
  • Farmer's Market: Families Working Together (2001, Carolrhoda Books)

Crime fiction

  • Murder on the Red River (2017, Cinco Puntos Press, republished by Soho Press in 2022)
  • Girl Gone Missing (2019, Cinco Puntos Press, republished by Soho Press in 2022)
  • Sinister Graves (2022, Soho Press)
  • Where They Last Saw Her (2024, Bantam Books)
  • Broken Fields (2025, Soho Press)

Short stories

  • "Wingless" in Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology (ed. Shane Hawk and Theodore C. Van Alst Jr., 2023, Vintage Books)

References

  1. 1 2 3 Combs, Marianne (23 August 2020). "McKnight Foundation names Ojibwe author Marcie Rendon Distinguished Artist of the year". MPR News.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Steeves, Carolyn (2002-11-20). "Marcie Rendon". Voices from the Gaps, University of Minnesota.
  3. ↑ "In Conversation with Indigenous Author Marcie Rendon: 'I Come From a People Who…'". Case Western Reserve University. Retrieved 2026-04-03.
  4. 1 2 Rendon, Marcie R. (2026-02-05). "Letter From Minnesota: We Are a People Born and Bred of Organizers". Literary Hub. Retrieved 2026-04-03.
  5. 1 2 3 Hobbes, Dwight (18 February 2009). "MN VOICES | Marcie Rendon". Twin Cities Daily Planet. Retrieved 2020-03-03.
  6. 1 2 Battistella, Maureen Flanagan (2025-05-01). "An Interview with Marcie Rendon". Literary Ashland.
  7. 1 2 "Past Winners". Pinckley Prizes. Retrieved 2026-04-03.
  8. ↑ "Category List – Sue Grafton Memorial Award". Edgar® Awards Info & Database. Retrieved 2026-04-03.
  9. ↑ Samek, Katie (2025-02-23). "Faribault County Reads: Where They Last Saw Her". Faribault County Register. Retrieved 2026-04-03.
  10. ↑ Hobbes, Dwight (2026-04-03). "An Author's Author". the alley Newspaper. Retrieved 2026-04-03.
  11. ↑ Holding Eagle III, Mathew (2022-12-22). "Marcie Rendon's long journey to award-winning novelist". MPR News. Retrieved 2026-04-04.
  12. ↑ "Marcie Rendon (Authors)". Strong Nations. Retrieved 2020-03-03.
  13. ↑ "Marcie R. Rendon". The Poetry Foundation. 2018-01-11. Retrieved 2026-04-04.
  14. ↑ "Marcie Rendon". Visual Collaborative. May 2019. Retrieved 15 August 2021.
  15. ↑ "U.S based Festival Platform Visual Collaborative features Seun Kuti & Other Africans". BellaNaija. 17 June 2019. Retrieved 29 June 2019.
  16. ↑ "Seun Kuti, Chris Uwaje, Others to be featured on Visual Collaborative". This Day. 2019-06-17. Retrieved 28 September 2019.
  17. ↑ "Outstanding Book Awards". Wisconsin Library Association. Archived from the original on 2014-12-21.
  18. ↑ "Author and Arts Activist to Address 2020 Graduates in Virtual Ceremony". Adler University. 2020-12-02. Retrieved 2022-06-22.
  19. ↑ Tostrud, Alexandra (2025-02-11). "Minnesota Book Awards Announce 2025 Finalists". Mpls.St.Paul Magazine. Retrieved 2026-03-28.
  20. ↑ Rendon, Marcie R; Bellville, Cheryl Walsh (1996). Powwow summer: a family celebrates the circle of life. Minneapolis: Carolrhoda Books. ISBN 978-0-585-34120-0. OCLC 47011928.
  21. ↑ Rendon, Marcie R; Bellville, Cheryl Walsh (2001). Farmer's market: families working together. Carolrhoda Books. ISBN 978-1-57505-462-9. OCLC 44117885.
  22. ↑ Rendon, Marcie R. (2017). Murder on the Red River. Cinco Puntos Press. ISBN 978-1-941026-52-6. OCLC 945948756.
  23. ↑ "Murder on the Red River". Soho Press. Retrieved 2022-06-22.
  24. ↑ Rendon, Marcie R. (2019). Girl gone missing. Cinco Puntos Press. ISBN 978-1-947627-11-6. OCLC 1055914927.
  25. ↑ "Girl Gone Missing". Soho Press. Retrieved 2022-06-22.
  26. ↑ "Sinister Graves". Soho Press. Retrieved 2022-06-22.
  27. ↑ "Where They Last Saw Her". Penguin Random House. Retrieved 2022-06-22.
  28. ↑ Locke, Deborah (April 5, 2025). "Rendon's new book delivers fast-paced plot set in Red River Valley". The Circle.
  29. ↑ "Never Whistle at Night: 9780593468463". PenguinRandomHouse.com. Retrieved 2024-01-09.