Mood Reads | Heart Berries: A Memoir

Heart Berries: A Memoir

Terese Marie Mailhot

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A powerful, poetic memoir of an Indigenous woman's coming of age on the Seabird Island Band in the Pacific Northwest—this New York Times bestseller and Emma Watson Book Club pick is “an illuminating account of grief, abuse and the complex nature of the Native experience . . . at once raw and achingly beautiful” (NPR).

Having survived a profoundly dysfunctional upbringing only to find herself hospitalized and facing a dual diagnosis of post traumatic stress disorder and bipolar II disorder, Terese Marie Mailhot is given a notebook and begins to write her way out of trauma. The triumphant result is Heart Berries, a memorial for Mailhot's mother, a social worker and activist who had a thing for prisoners; a story of reconciliation with her father—an abusive drunk and a brilliant artist—who was murdered under mysterious circumstances; and an elegy on how difficult it is to love someone while dragging the long shadows of shame.

Mailhot trusts the reader to understand that memory isn't exact, but melded to imagination, pain, and what we can bring ourselves to accept. Her unique and at times unsettling voice graphically illustrates her mental state. As she writes, she discovers her own true voice, seizes control of her story, and, in so doing, reestablishes her connection to her family, to her people, and to her place in the world.

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Posts about this title from Mood Reads

Mood Reads\ \ Hannah\ \ • Jan 31 2024

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WHEW! My first monthly wrap up of 2024! 23 books!! #januarywrapup #januarybooks #2024books #booktok #booksireadthismonth #bookish

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Posts about this book from across Bindery

The Black Bird Commons\ \ Tim\ \ • Oct 2 2024

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What makes a Great Memoir?

Some prolonged thoughts on some of my favourite memoirs.

18 books

The Black Bird Commons\ \ Tim\ \ • Oct 1 2024

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Episode 10: Minda Honey

Join my conversation with Minda Honey, author of THE HEARTBREAK YEARS, a mmoir about one woman's journey through her 20s and the love and relationships she experiences before she turns 30.

We talk about the book, and how the people within become "characters" even as it's a memoir. We talk about making friends as an adult. We talk about her writing journey and how it got from fictional stories, to essays, to a full-fledged Memoir.

She also tells us which of the many cities she has lived in would be the life of a party, if cities were humans!

11 books