Pieces of My Mother: A Memoir

Description

One summer, Melissa Cistaro's mother drove off without a word. Devastated, she and her brothers were left to pick up the pieces, wondering why their mother abandoned them. Decades later, Melissa finds herself at her dying mother's side, with just days to find out what happened that summer and confront the fear she could do the same to her own children. She never expects to stumble on a cache of letters her mother wrote but never sent, which could hold the answers she seeks. Haunting yet ultimately uplifting, Pieces of My Mother reveals how our parents' choices impact ours and how we can survive those to forge our own paths.

Melissa Cistaro is a bookseller and the events coordinator at Book Passage, the legendary San Francisco Bay Area independent bookstore, where she has hosted more than 200 authors. A writer and mother, she has been published in numerous literary journals including the New Ohio Review, Anderbo.com, and Brevity as well as in two anthologies alongside Anne Lamott, Jane Smiley, and other writers. Melissa graduated with honors from UCLA and continued her education with the UCLA Extension Writers' Program. She has participated in the Tin House Writer's Workshop in Portland and The Writer's Studio in Los Angeles. She lives in San Francisco.

"Full of hope, regret and lessons learned, "Pieces of My Mother" is a unique and compelling look at how profoundly mothers affect our lives. Whether absent or hauntingly close, longing for a mother can force a child into maturity beyond her years, and garner her with a lifetime of longing. This book is as lyrical as it is honest, as humorous as it is heartbreaking." - MONICA HOLLOWAY, bestselling author of Cowboy & Wills and Driving with Dead People