The Berry Pickers

'For fans of Celeste Ng and Ann Patchett, this quietly beautiful book will break, then mend, your heart' Amazon, The Best Books of 2023 
 
WINNER OF THE 2023 BARNES & NOBLE DISCOVER PRIZE 
WINNER OF THE 2024 ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE IN FICTION 
 
*** 
One family’s deepest pain. Another’s darkest secret. Who will they be when the truth comes out? 
 
On a hot day in 1960s Maine, six-year-old Joe watches his little sister Ruthie, sitting on her favourite rock at the edge of the blueberry fields, while their family, Mi’kmaq people from Nova Scotia, pick fruit. That afternoon, Ruthie vanishes without a trace. As the last person to see her, Joe will be forever haunted by grief, guilt, and the agony of imagining how his life could have been. 
 
In an affluent suburb nearby, Norma is growing up as the only child of unhappy parents. She is smart, precocious, and bursting with questions she isn’t allowed to ask – questions about her missing baby photos; questions about her dark skin; questions about the strange, vivid dreams of campfires and warm embraces that return night after night. Norma senses there are things her parents aren’t telling her, but it will take decades to unravel the secrets they have kept buried since she was a little girl. 
 
The Berry Pickers is an exquisitely moving story of unrelenting hope, unwavering love, and the power of family – even in the face of grief and betrayal. 
 
'Marvellous ... Amanda Peters is going to be the next big thing ... The Berry Pickers is a triumph' Katherena Vermette, author of The Strangers 
 
'Peters excels in writing characters for whom we can't help rooting' The New York Times 
 
'Lucid and assured' The New Yorker, Best Books of 2023

For fans of Celeste Ng and Ann Patchett, this quietly beautiful book will break, then mend, your heart

The ghosts of lost children haunt generations in this lucid and assured début

A poignant debut from a writer to watch

Enthralling ... Powerfully rendered ... A cogent and heartfelt look at the ineffable pull of family ties

Poignant ... Reads like a modern literary classic ... Moving, heartbreaking, and hopeful, The Berry Pickers is a powerful tale of haunting regret, bonds that will never be broken, and unrelenting love

Nick Medina, author of Sisters of the Lost Nation

The Berry Pickers is just like a handful of berries ... filled with so much sweet, so much sour, so much juice. Reading this book, I was only ever hungry when it ended

Morgan Talty, author of Night of the Living Rez

Peters brilliantly crafts a multi-layered tale of how one irrational act creates irrevocable harm that ripples through multiple lives ... A fluid and emotional read that is both plainly and beautifully rendered ... An amazing read from an amazing new voice

Michelle Good, author of Five Little Indians

A beautiful novel about family and about the way it makes and breaks and remakes us again ... It contains a cast of characters you will never forget. With this book, Amanda Peters establishes herself as an essential new voice

Alexander MacLeod, author of Animal Person

Peters weaves a persistent thread of hope and resilience through her remarkable debut novel

Lyrical ... You cannot help but love these characters from the first chapter, they stay with you long after the last page

Cherie Dimaline, author of The Marrow Thieves

Heartbreaking and genuine, this saga of a family dealing with the disappearance of a beloved child will resonate with readers of historical fiction, Indigenous fiction and anyone who enjoys a solidly written story

This emotional debut is a beautifully told story of identity, loss, and the power of love

Offers a deep exploration into the human spirit and the meaning of connection

An unputdownable novel of identity, forgiveness, and insistent hope

A profound study of the love, grief and betrayals of two families

inews, The best new books to read in November 2023

AMANDA PETERS is a writer of Mi’kmaq and settler ancestry. A graduate of the Master of Fine Arts Program at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe, New Mexico, she has a Certificate in Creative Writing from the University of Toronto. She is the winner of the 2021 Indigenous Voices Award for Unpublished Prose and a participant in the 2021 Writers’ Trust Rising Stars program. She lives in the Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia. The Berry Pickers is her first novel.

One family’s deepest pain. Another’s darkest secret. Who will they be when the truth comes out? 
 
On a hot day in 1960s Maine, six-year-old Joe watches his little sister Ruthie, sitting on her favourite rock at the edge of the blueberry fields, while their family, Mi’kmaq people from Nova Scotia, pick fruit. That afternoon, Ruthie vanishes without a trace. As the last person to see her, Joe will be forever haunted by grief, guilt, and the agony of imagining how his life could have been. 
 
In an affluent suburb nearby, Norma is growing up as the only child of unhappy parents. She is smart, precocious, and bursting with questions she isn’t allowed to ask – about her missing baby photos; her dark skin; the strange, vivid dreams of campfires and warm embraces that return night after night. Norma senses there are things her parents aren’t telling her, but it will take decades to unravel the secrets they have kept buried since she was a little girl. 
 
The Berry Pickers is an exquisitely moving story of unrelenting hope, unwavering love, and the power of family – even in the face of grief and betrayal.

Amanda Peters

A tender story of self-discovery and the power of generations of women

As I stood under it, looking up into the branches, listening as the wind rustled the leaves, I could hear my Kiju’s voice: “This tree holds our stories.” 
 
Born under the shadow of a tree sacred to generations of Indigenous women, Aliet has been brought up by her fierce, loving grandmother, Kiju. Her father remains a mystery, and her mother died under that very tree, gently held by its cradle of roots as Aliet came into the world. 
 
But now the world beyond their small community is changing. Local women are increasingly reluctant to follow traditional birthing rituals, and at the hospital, white doctors are sceptical of Indigenous practices. Aliet and Kiju are distraught to witness their prejudice turn into condemnation, but decades later, Aliet too will move away and work as a nurse in the city, administering modern medicine while still holding her grandmother’s wisdom dear. 
 
When Kiju passes away suddenly, grief-stricken Aliet understands that she must return to the tree: only these roots can help her reconnect with her heritage, and discover long-buried secrets about herself. It is the start of Aliet’s journey to protect her land, her traditions, and the memory of the women who came before her, as she decides which parts of her inheritance she will carry into the future.

Amanda Peters

Praise for The Birthing Tree

A tender story of self-discovery and the power of generations of women

Books by Amanda Peters

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