The Berry Pickers | Potato Salad
Nostalgic, moving, contemplative. These are the words I would use to describe The Berry Pickers - about a family’s love, hope, and determination in the midst of heartbreak.
A young girl goes missing while her Nova Scotian family of Mi’kmaw heritage is working the berry fields in Maine. Told from two POV’s, this story encapsulates the effect that grief has on our choices and how lies that become truth can suppress the past. We follow Norma, a young girl who is raised in a loving family but is stifled by her overbearing and overprotective mother, who makes her second guess her own memories. And Joe, the brother of the missing girl, who feels responsible for being the last one who saw her and struggles throughout his life to not let grief dictate his actions.
Be forewarned, this is not a light book. A lot of difficult topics are covered throughout, so you may want to check trigger warnings, but I believe they are handled in a thoughtful and insightful manner.
This may not be a nostalgic book for everyone. But for me, Amanda Peters descriptions brought me back to my own childhood and placed me right into the setting, making it easy for me to connect with the characters and empathize with them, even when they made terrible choices.
“It’s a tragedy that we only come to these understandings when we’re too old for them to be useful.”
Scents unleash memories. The smell of gingersnap cookies remind me of coming in from the blistering cold and my mom serving up warm cookies and milk. A waft of freshly cut wood brings me back to the forest, cutting fallen trees with my Dad for firewood. In The Berry Pickers that scent is boiling potatoes over the campfire. That combination of smells is woven throughout the book — making memories and bringing them back. So I just had to make a potato salad to enjoy alongside smoky BBQ and campfire meals.
It’s a simple recipe - boiled potatoes, hard-boiled eggs, celery, and green onions mixed together in a mustardy dressing. And it goes with so many different sunny day meals. Ready to enhance your own summer memories!
What scents store memories for you?
Potato Salad
2 lbs red potatoes
6 hard boiled eggs
2 celery stalks, diced
3 green onions, sliced
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground pepper
½ teaspoon garlic powder
1 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons yellow mustard
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
Boil potatoes in salted water until tender. Allow to cool then cut into 1 inch chunks. Peel and chop eggs into bite size pieces.
Toss together potatoes, eggs, celery, green onions, salt, pepper, and garlic in a large bowl.
Stir together mayo, musard, and vinegar until well blended. Pour over salad ingredients and toss to coat. Cover and put in the fridge until thoroughly chilled (give it at least an hour).
Hi I’m Cheri, I’ve been staying up too late reading since I was a kid hiding under the covers with a flashlight.