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sarahrigg 's review for:
Heart Berries
by Terese Marie Mailhot
Mailhot tells the story of growing up in her poor, chaotic home on the Rez, having children, and having the eldest taken away from her when her mental health deteriorates. Later, treated for bipolar disorder, she is on an upward trend but tends to self-sabotage, doing stupid things for love.
In the afterward, she mentions that people will call the memoir "raw" without acknowledging the art that went into telling it raw. But she also says she tries to tell it with all her flaws on display, so as not to make herself the innocent victim in it all, like when she punches her lover (later husband) in a jealous fit and gives him a black eye.
This was a hard read! It's short, but the subject matter of mental illness, abuse, and poverty, is difficult, and the narrative bops around in time. Mailhot writes a lot in short, choppy sentences that give the writing the feel of a poem or a chant.
From what she says in the afterward, it seems that Mailhot wanted to tell a memoir by a Native American woman that did not conform to archetypes and showed the ugly along with the sacred. She's done that here. She seems like a talent to follow.
In the afterward, she mentions that people will call the memoir "raw" without acknowledging the art that went into telling it raw. But she also says she tries to tell it with all her flaws on display, so as not to make herself the innocent victim in it all, like when she punches her lover (later husband) in a jealous fit and gives him a black eye.
This was a hard read! It's short, but the subject matter of mental illness, abuse, and poverty, is difficult, and the narrative bops around in time. Mailhot writes a lot in short, choppy sentences that give the writing the feel of a poem or a chant.
From what she says in the afterward, it seems that Mailhot wanted to tell a memoir by a Native American woman that did not conform to archetypes and showed the ugly along with the sacred. She's done that here. She seems like a talent to follow.