The Berry Pickers: A Novel
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
2023 Barnes & Noble Discover Prize Winner
Winner of the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction
A four-year-old Mi’kmaq girl goes missing from the blueberry fields of Maine, sparking a mystery that will haunt the survivors, unravel a family, and remain unsolved for nearly fifty years
"A stunning debut about love, race, brutality, and the balm of forgiveness." —People, A Best New Book
July 1962. Following in the tradition of Indigenous workers from Nova Scotia, a Mi’kmaq family arrives in Maine to pick blueberries for the summer. Weeks later, four-year-old Ruthie, the family’s youngest child, vanishes. She is last seen by her six-year-old brother, Joe, sitting on a favorite rock at the edge of a berry field. Joe will remain distraught by his sister’s disappearance for years to come.
In Maine, a young girl named Norma grows up as the only child of an affluent family. Her father is emotionally distant, her mother frustratingly overprotective. Norma is often troubled by recurring dreams and visions that seem more like memories than imagination. As she grows older, Norma slowly comes to realize there is something her parents aren’t telling her. Unwilling to abandon her intuition, she will spend decades trying to uncover this family secret.
“An unforgettable exploration of grief, love, and kin,” (The Boston Globe), this show stopping debut by a vibrant new voice in fiction is a riveting novel about the search for truth, the shadow of trauma, and the persistence of love across time.
2023 Barnes & Noble Discover Prize Winner
Winner of the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction
A four-year-old Mi’kmaq girl goes missing from the blueberry fields of Maine, sparking a mystery that will haunt the survivors, unravel a family, and remain unsolved for nearly fifty years
"A stunning debut about love, race, brutality, and the balm of forgiveness." —People, A Best New Book
July 1962. Following in the tradition of Indigenous workers from Nova Scotia, a Mi’kmaq family arrives in Maine to pick blueberries for the summer. Weeks later, four-year-old Ruthie, the family’s youngest child, vanishes. She is last seen by her six-year-old brother, Joe, sitting on a favorite rock at the edge of a berry field. Joe will remain distraught by his sister’s disappearance for years to come.
In Maine, a young girl named Norma grows up as the only child of an affluent family. Her father is emotionally distant, her mother frustratingly overprotective. Norma is often troubled by recurring dreams and visions that seem more like memories than imagination. As she grows older, Norma slowly comes to realize there is something her parents aren’t telling her. Unwilling to abandon her intuition, she will spend decades trying to uncover this family secret.
“An unforgettable exploration of grief, love, and kin,” (The Boston Globe), this show stopping debut by a vibrant new voice in fiction is a riveting novel about the search for truth, the shadow of trauma, and the persistence of love across time.
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Community Reviews
What to say about this book… It was an ok story. Nothing special and I don’t feel it went anywhere. It was emotional/sad, and I found myself tearing up at parts, but overall, it just left me wanting more from the story. Ruthie was kidnapped, but there really wasn’t any mystery around it, not sure why I expected that, and we knew from that first chapter from Norma’s POV that she was Ruthie. Her chapters told of her sheltered life and eventual breaking out from under her mother’s thumb.
The chapters from Joe’s POV were a recounting of how the family delt with Ruthie’s disappearance and other tragedies that came after. Eventually Joe left the family and then it was his story of managing his anger and running away from everyone. I don’t know I just didn’t really see the point.
I saw in the back of the book that this was a debut for this author, and she’s a writer of Mi’kmaq history and settler ancestry. While we did get a glimpse into the life of a nomadic family that traveled together and worked the land picking berries during the late 60’s early 70’s, they could have any nationality. There wasn’t any deep dive into the Indigenous culture of the time. Any mentions in the book felt glossed over and I think that was a miss on the Author’s part. Exploring that in more detail could have enhanced the story and at least added some historical significance to it.
This was such a heartwarming novel, in the end. Yes, the main characters endure a lot of emotional, physical, and psychological trauma, but they also experience unconditional love and forgiveness. One of the central themes involves a girl confused about her racial origins and another theme involves a family who has endured much loss and inevitable racism. I highly recommend this book.
Told from the alternating perspectives of Joe and Norma, this is a heartfelt and emotionally grounded story. There’s no real mystery about Norma’s identity—you realize almost immediately that she is Ruthie—so the tension comes from discovering when and how she’ll learn the truth about her past.
The novel is clearly well-written and well-researched, and it focuses primarily on the lives Joe and Ruthie/Norma built after Ruthie went missing. Their experiences, grief, and resilience form the core of the narrative, giving it a strong emotional pull.
However, a few elements made the reading experience less smooth. The story jumps between timelines with little to no warning, making it difficult to tell whether a scene is happening in the present or at some undefined point in the past. Flashbacks tend to begin abruptly, without clear cues or anchors, which can leave the reader struggling to orient themselves. There are very few markers to help track the timeframe, and that lack of clarity occasionally disrupts the flow.
Overall, it’s a touching story with memorable characters, but the timeline transitions could have been handled more clearly to enhance the reading experience
Told from the alternating perspectives of Joe and Norma, this is a heartfelt and emotionally grounded story. There’s no real mystery about Norma’s identity—you realize almost immediately that she is Ruthie—so the tension comes from discovering when and how she’ll learn the truth about her past.
The novel is clearly well-written and well-researched, and it focuses primarily on the lives Joe and Ruthie/Norma built after Ruthie went missing. Their experiences, grief, and resilience form the core of the narrative, giving it a strong emotional pull.
However, a few elements made the reading experience less smooth. The story jumps between timelines with little to no warning, making it difficult to tell whether a scene is happening in the present or at some undefined point in the past. Flashbacks tend to begin abruptly, without clear cues or anchors, which can leave the reader struggling to orient themselves. There are very few markers to help track the timeframe, and that lack of clarity occasionally disrupts the flow.
Overall, it’s a touching story with memorable characters, but the timeline transitions could have been handled more clearly to enhance the reading experience
LOVED. THIS. BOOK!
And hate not knowing how my “book friends’” lives will continue; the kind of story/characters that lend to that “book hangover” feeling…
The author did such a fantastic job developing these characters, their stories, and the settings I won’t soon stop seeing them in my mind’s eye.
And hate not knowing how my “book friends’” lives will continue; the kind of story/characters that lend to that “book hangover” feeling…
The author did such a fantastic job developing these characters, their stories, and the settings I won’t soon stop seeing them in my mind’s eye.
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