Once I got into the first few pages I really enjoyed this writing style. I loved the different stories and memoirs and really appreciated the style. Some confronting history. Thank you to the author. Thank you to #netgalley and the publisher for an ARC.

This is a fantastic read. Gurba's mix of personal stories and history on place had me hooked from the first page. I loved reading about rock collections, flowers, berries, and everything that encompasses. Inspiring and relatable, no matter where you are reading from. I enjoyed the focus on California. Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the E-ARC.

This is my first time reading Myriam Gurba and it's definitely not the last.

There are layers and layers of goodness in this book. Reading it has been an enriching experience: culturally, gender wise and just for the pleasure of it. I adore the author's way with words, mixing languages, meaning and personal significance, rhythm and magic.

There are book you just cannot relate to. This was not it for me. Being in the opposite side of the world from the fantastic Californian soil, having a different culture, but living the millennial woman life I couldn't feel closer to this narative. While Myriam Gurba speaks for herself, from her labyrinth of experiences and references, she illuminates a global search for a new relationship with the earth, with the body, a deeper understanding and relationship with our ancestor, an old / new spirituality of living with it all.

I cannot recommend this book enough and I am grateful to have received it in order to share my view on it. This is a piece of art that reveals a very specific window in our culture and we'll look back to this becoming a classic and a point of reference.

Miriam Gurba takes your hand and pulls you into this book and you never want to leave. Her honesty and fierce refusal to look away from the difficult truths we all experience allow the reader to learn more about themself and the world than they ever thought possible.
Each essay requires sustained attention to experience it fully. It is not a faint hearted exercise to enter Gurba’s narration — yet one emerges infinitely changed.
The California most think of is not the California many people experience. Gurba provides an unflinching look at her life there and in a strong, impactful voice full of wisdom (and joy) helps us inhabit a new state of mind.

This was such a quirky but lovely and unusual memoir! I expected no less, having read this author's previous two memoirs, but this one took a really interesting tack of exploring memoir through themes of California plants and the author's connection to them. It can feel a bit dreamy or filmy, is definitely not linear and much more experimental, but Gurba is such a talented and fascinating writer that I love going on the journey with her. Her writing is a master class in how memoir can be done, tempering trauma with humor. The photos were lovely too.