The Mason House
by T. Marie Bertineau
“In this graceful and moving memoir, Bertineau offers a series of stories about love, tenacity, resilience, and hope from a rare corner of the world.”
—M. Bartley Seigel, author of This Is What They Say
After her father's untimely death, Theresa faced a rocky and unstable childhood. But there was one place she felt safe: her grandmother's house in Mason, a depressed former copper mining town in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.
Gram's passing leaves Theresa once again at the mercy of the lasting, sometimes destructive grief of her Ojibwe mother and white stepfather. As the family travels back and forth across the country in search of a better life, one thing becomes clear: if they want to find peace, they will need to return to their roots.
The Mason House is at once an elegy for lost loved ones and a tale of growing up amid hardship and hope, exploring how time and the support of a community can at last begin to heal even the deepest wounds.
BIO026000 BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs
BIO002000 BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Cultural, Ethnic & Regional / General
BIO022000 BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Women
Print: $18.00, EPUB $9.99
Print ISBN: 978-1-941360-43-9
Digital ISBN: 978-1-941360-44-6
Publication Date: September 29, 2020
Publicity Contact: Feliza Casano, publicity@lanternfishpress.com
Photo Credit: Natalie Carolyn Photography
About the Author
Born amidst the copper mining ruins of northern Michigan, Marie is the daughter of an Ojibwe mother and a French Canadian and Cornish father. A writer since the age of eleven, she has worked in business communications, as a journalist, and freelanced in online content. Marie writes both memoir and fiction, and her work has appeared online with the Arts Consortium of Carver County (Minnesota) as well as in Mino Mikiina zine, a publication of the Waub Ajijaak Press for the Native Justice Coalition. She is a member of the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community on the L’Anse Reservation, migizi odoodeman. Married and the mother of two, she makes her home in the Upper Midwest.
Comp Titles
J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
Jeanette Walls, The Glass Castle
Joanna Howard, Rerun Era
Melissa Febos, Abandon Me
Tanya Tagaq, Split Tooth
Nicole Chung, All You Can Ever Know
Nadja Spiegelman, I'm Supposed to Protect You From All This
Talking Points for Booksellers & Librarians
Excellent next read for readers who loved The Glass Castle and Hillbilly Elegy
An intimate family portrait that explores multigenerational trauma and healing
A great choice for book clubs that enjoy family memoirs told through gorgeous prose
Praise for The Mason House
"Touching and authentic."
—Faith Sullivan, author of Good Night, Mr. Wodehouse
“T. Marie Bertineau breaks my heart. The Mason House is cast with an assortment of people I recognize as if they were my own family. A powerful celebration of the ties that bind us and of eccentric, laugh-out-loud moments of love, grace, and what it means to be kin."
—Tiffany Midge, Author of Bury My Heart at Chuck E. Cheese
“In this graceful and moving memoir, Bertineau offers a series of stories about love, tenacity, resilience, and hope, from a rare corner of the world, and brought beautifully to life for the reader. Perhaps most striking, The Mason House manages to capture the intimate striations of multi-generational trauma without ever losing its humor or hope, even as it paints an intimate and complicated portrait of life in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula absent the Stormy Kromer’d caricatures so popular in Great Lakes regionalism. After finishing the book, I felt I’d walked generous miles in her shoes, and that her family was very much my own.”
—M. Bartley Seigel, author of This Is What They Say