Heart Berries
by Terese Marie Mailhot · 2018
Buy on AmazonA powerful, poetic memoir of a woman's coming of age on the Seabird Island Indian Reservation in the Pacific Northwest. 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.
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Our Shared Shelf — Complete Picks (2016–2019) · goodreads.com
"Written in part while the author was living in a mental institution, Heart Berries is a fierce and poetic memoir that grips you from the start and never lets go. Each page, paragraph and sentence is more gut-wrenching than the one before it. An illuminating account of grief, abuse and the complex nature of the Native experience, it is at once raw and achingly beautiful. Terese Mailhot is a truly fearless writer, and this little book is nothing short of a gift."
NPR Books We Love — 2018 · apps.npr.org
"There are so many sentences I had to read again because they were so true and beautiful. It's a memoir of pure poetry and courage and invention. Whenever I think about it, my heart clenches with love."
By the Book: Cheryl Strayed · nytimes.com