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3.91 AVERAGE
3.91 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
sad
slow-paced
The writing in the book was poignant and the story was powerful. The one problem for me however, was the lack of flow between events in the story. This made it hard to follow at times and I felt like the author kept moving onto the next thing before fleshing out the previous one.
This is definitely a powerful book to show insights into what it feels like to struggle with mental illness. I didn’t love it, but I didn’t hate it. I wasn’t as moved by it as other readers have been, maybe because it was a little traumatic for me to read because I empathize with her struggle so well.
"You think weakness is a problem. I want to be torn apart by everything.”
An emotion-driven memoir that is incredibly beautiful and poetic. Mailhot writes her story about abuse, addiction, mental illness, and survival as a Native American woman in such a way that it is tough to read, and yet, I found myself unable to put it down. Her writing is often disjointed but it works in her favor. I feel that it works well to represent her unbalanced life. It is moving.
An emotion-driven memoir that is incredibly beautiful and poetic. Mailhot writes her story about abuse, addiction, mental illness, and survival as a Native American woman in such a way that it is tough to read, and yet, I found myself unable to put it down. Her writing is often disjointed but it works in her favor. I feel that it works well to represent her unbalanced life. It is moving.
Such a quick read I wish I had more time to sink into its rhythm. Still Mailhot's story is beautiful but devastating, and the way she manages to make lyricism modern is impressive.
medium-paced
Experimental memoir? I was skeptical. But Heart Berries was on multiple lists and so I picked it up. And then I couldn't put it down.
I don't know if I'll ever become a fan of experimental styles of writing, but this worked, and it is in reading the afterword/interview that I understood a little bit more about why it worked. If you are the sort of person (me) who usually skips the author interviews at the end of the book, don't skip this one. I think it is integral to really putting the whole book together.
Heart Berries is alternately confusing and painful. The quote that stood out to me the most was "In my culture, I believe we carry pain until we can reconcile with it through ceremony. Pain is not framed like a problem with a solution. I don't even know that white people see transcendence the way we do. I'm not sure that their dichotomies apply to me." This, to me, was the essence of Heart Berries; the understanding that there isn't pain/no pain, but rather pain in different forms, pain that is always a part of the journey we take. Life is less about ridding ourselves of the pain than it is finding a way to transcend it, a way, perhaps, to respect it for the complex thing that it is.
I don't know if I'll ever become a fan of experimental styles of writing, but this worked, and it is in reading the afterword/interview that I understood a little bit more about why it worked. If you are the sort of person (me) who usually skips the author interviews at the end of the book, don't skip this one. I think it is integral to really putting the whole book together.
Heart Berries is alternately confusing and painful. The quote that stood out to me the most was "In my culture, I believe we carry pain until we can reconcile with it through ceremony. Pain is not framed like a problem with a solution. I don't even know that white people see transcendence the way we do. I'm not sure that their dichotomies apply to me." This, to me, was the essence of Heart Berries; the understanding that there isn't pain/no pain, but rather pain in different forms, pain that is always a part of the journey we take. Life is less about ridding ourselves of the pain than it is finding a way to transcend it, a way, perhaps, to respect it for the complex thing that it is.
HEY DO YOU WANNA READ SOMETHING LYRICAL AND DEVASTATING??
here you go
here you go