The Mason House

Product Description

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.

Review

“In this graceful and moving memoir, Bertineau offers a series of stories about love, tenacity, resilience, and hope . . . 
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.”

–M. Bartley Seigel, author of This Is What They Say

“Touching and authentic.”

–Faith Sullivan, author of
Good Night, Mr. Wodehouse

“A powerful celebration of the ties that bind us and 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

Bookstagram:
“Bertineau. . .  beautifully writes about her family’s struggle with grief and addiction, while also inspiring hope and humor.”
–@floury_words
“In 
The Mason House, T. Marie Bertineau offers a remembrance of her life. Bursting with pain, with joy, with poverty, with comfort, she recounts her stories of love and loss and the unique ways we all make sense of our worlds.”
–@theprosepantry

“Read this book if you are hurting. Read it if you are healing. Read it to know the difference.”

–@pages.of.emery

About the Author

T. Marie Bertineau is of Anishinaabe-Ojibwe and French Canadian/Cornish descent. She is a member of the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community on the L’Anse Reservation, migizi odoodeman.