Far from the Tree. When families are dysfunctional Saturday October 20th 2012 / McNally Jackson Bookshop
The Author
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Mira Bartók is a Chicago-born artist and writer and the author of twenty-eight books for children. Her writing has appeared in several literary journals and anthologies, and has been noted in The Best American Essays series. She lives in western Massachusetts, where she runs Mira’s List, a blog that helps artists find funding and residences all over the world. She has received awards from such organizations as the Fulbright-Hayes Foundation, the Associated Writing Programs, the Illinois Arts Council, Pollock-Krasner Grant, and the Carnegie Fund for Writers. The Memory Palace is the National Book Critics Circle Award winner for 2011 in the autobiography category, the ALA Notable Books winner in the nonfiction category, and the winner of the New England Book Festival competition in the autobiography category. The Memory Palace was named a Best Book of 2011 by The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The Globe and Mail, Library Journal, and Bookpage.
The Memory Palace: A Memoir (Free Press, 2011)
Mira’s List: http://www.miraslist.com
When piano prodigy Norma Herr was healthy, she was the most vibrant personality in the room. But as her schizophrenic episodes became more frequent and more dangerous, she withdrew into a world that neither of her daughters could make any sense of. After Norma attacked her, Mira Barótk and her sister changed their names and cut off all contact in order to keep themselves safe. For the next seventeen years Mira’s only contact with her mother was through infrequent letters exchanged through post office boxes, often not even in the same city where she was living. At the age of forty, Mira suffered a debilitating head injury that left her memories foggy and her ability to make sense of the world around her forever changed. Hoping to reconnect with her past, Mira learned Norma was dying in a hospital, and she and her sister traveled to their mother’s deathbed to reconcile one last time. Through stunning prose and gorgeous original art, The Memory Palace explores the connections between mother and daughter that cannot be broken no matter how much exists—or is lost—between them.
Bibliography
Reviews
> Nonfiction
“The ineffable functioning of memory and the brain itself is integral to Bartók’s complex story. She brilliantly teases out the emotional and physical fallout of her mother’s brain, damaged by illness…The fact that Bartók can convey how and why she still loves her mother is perhaps the book’s greatest triumph.” The Boston Globe “...like the cabinet of wonders that is a frequent motif here, Bartok’s memory palace contains some rare, distinctive and genuinely imaginative treasures.” The New York Times Book Review “The Memory Palace is not so much a palace of memories as a complex web of bewitching verbal and visual images, memories, dreams, true stories and rambling excerpts from the author’s mentally ill mother’s notebooks. It is an extraordinary mix.” The Washington Post “In lyrically elegant prose, The Memory Palace explores not just relationships but the slippery nature of memory itself.” O magazine
Ressources
The Memory Palace: A Memoir (Free Press, 2011) >Children’s books
© Doug Plavin
Mira Bartók United States
Stencils : Ancient and Living Cultures Series, with Christine Ronan (Good Year Books, 1996-2004) Big World Read Along Series, with Christine Ronan (Good Year Books, 1996)
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