
The Berry Pickers By Amanda Peters 2023, 320 pgs, Catapult
The Berry Pickers is a debut novel, set in Maine and in the Mi’kmaw territory of Nova Scotia, by an author who, like the characters in the book, has an Indian/NovaScotian background. The two main characters in the novel are a brother and sister of the Mi’kmaw tribe. The sister, Ruthie, was taken from her family by a white couple and raised as their own; they renamed her Norma, and concealed her heritage from her. Although they loved her and cared for her, there was only fear and guilt in the air around her as she grew up.
Her brother Joe never got over his own guilt about having allowed her to wander off while they were playing together–even though she was only four and he not much older. From that point on, his life seemed to go downhill. He drank too much, left home abruptly, destroyed his marriage, abandoned his family. The novel begins as he lies dying from what appears to be lung cancer, trying to make clear his remorse and atone from the pain his grievous errors have caused.
The thread of racism runs through the book, though not in a bitter way, but as a fact of life. As the years pass, that theme begins to recede. In its place, the focus on the importance of family, and the ways in which family members can damage one another and also heal one another, take center stage. Ruthie learns forgiveness, Joe receives forgiveness, and other family members participate in the process, thereby empowering a powerful reconciliation.
There is great suffering in this book, balanced by great warmth and loving kindness. The very concept of family is probed and reimagined. The author’s descriptions–not only of the countryside, but also of more mundane items in everyday life–are presented with competence, even sometimes poetic. The prose is skillful and the characters and their ways of life are convincingly portrayed; you believe in them and feel you know them. The ending, though positive, is earned; it is not an easy “wrap-up” sort of final chapter. In this novel what’s done is done, and you sense that the characters are going to move forward in significantly productive ways. Miracles can happen!