Dog Flowers: A Memoir

"After Danielle Geller's mother dies of alcohol withdrawal while homeless, she is forced to return to Florida. Using her training as a librarian and archivist, Geller collects her mother's documents, diaries, and photographs into a single suitcase and begins a journey of confronting her family, her harrowing past, and the decisions she's been forced to make, a journey that will end at her mother's home--the Navajo reservation. Geller masterfully intertwines wrenching prose with archival documents to create a deeply moving narrative of loss and inheritance that pays homage to our pasts, traditions, heritage, and the family we are given, and the ones we choose"--
An award-winning essayist draws on archival documents in a narrative account that explores how her family’s troubled past and the death of her mother, a homeless alcoholic, reflected the traditions and tragic history of her Navajo heritage. Illustrations.
A daughter returns home to the Navajo reservation to confront her family's troubled history and retrace her mother's life--using both narrative and archive in this unforgettable and heart-wrenching memoir.After Danielle Geller's mother dies of a withdrawal from alcohol during a period of homelessness, she is forced to return to Florida. Using her training as a librarian and archivist, Geller collects her mother's documents, diaries, and photographs into a single suitcase and begins on a journey of confronting her family's history and the decisions she's been forced to make, a journey that will end at her mother's home: the Navajo reservation.Geller masterfully intertwines wrenching prose with archival documents to create a deeply moving narrative of loss and inheritance that pays homage to our pasts, traditions, heritage, the family we are given, and the family we choose.