A review by jesslinkletter
The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters

emotional sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I did enjoy this book and felt it was deeply emotional and thought provoking regarding grief and how we deal with it in different ways. I feel like there's not a lot spelled out in this book (for example, that the sixties scoop was very real and that several children were taken from indigenous families, that the police really would not care about a missing indigenous child unfortunately, and also that June and Alice were queer), and I feel like if you missed those points you may not have enjoyed it as much. 

I do wish that this story had taken one of two other routes - either having Ruthie return to her family earlier on and show her reconnecting to her Indigenous culture, or making where she was and if she would return more of a mystery instead of revealing everything in the first few chapters. 

But overall, Amanda Peters wrote incredibly complex characters and weaved them together through such a tragic, grief stricken story. It explores family bonds as a primary theme, as well as identity. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Terminal illness, Dementia, Kidnapping, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail