What Are You
What Are You Reading? A project sponsored by the Friends of the Macomb Public Library District to encourage reading and book discussion in our community. Would you like to share your favorite books with other readers? Please send your name, occupation or grade level, book author and title, and a brief statement about the book and why you liked it to Kate Joswick, [email protected].
Reviewer’s Name: Sandy Shearer Reviewer’s Occupation: Retired Book Title: The Berry Pickers Book’s Author: Amanda Peters This is the debut novel by a young woman from Nova Scotia who is part indigenous. The book was the winner of the Andrew Carnegie 2023 Medal for Excellence in Fiction, and I feel like it certainly deserved this award for this well-written, gripping, haunting story. It is the story of two families--one an indigenous family and another that is a white family. In July 1962 a Mi'kmaq family traveled on their annual journey from Nova Scotia to Maine to pick blueberries. In the fall, they stayed to pick apples. This is a hard-working, close family that is suddenly thrust into tragedy when 4-year-old Ruthie wanders off and the family is unable to find her. The family searches and searches and never gives up that she is somewhere alive.
The novel has two narrators, Joe, Ruthie's older brother who felt enormous guilt because he was the last to see Ruthie before she disappeared, and Norma, who lives in another state and grows up in an oppressive home atmosphere. This gripping novel of well-defined characters and family relationships and race was one that I could not put down and one that has me months later still thinking about the choices these characters made.
