Wild Blueberries: Tales of Nuns, Rabbits & Discovery in Rural Michigan

Some writers look at life with their eyes, others with their heart. In this beautifully illustrated collection of evocative, funny, and moving stories, Peter Damm does both. These are vignettes of growing up in small town, rural Michigan, but also a closely observed portrait of mid-century America. The tone is alternately wry, elegiac, poignant and humorous, as Damm recalls the joys of fishing on a northern lake, the rigors and confusion of childhood, or feasting on blueberries in autumn. But this isn't a collection of pretty postcards. Damm's family experienced difficulty, alcoholism and loss, and he writes with a survivor's compassion. The writing is beautiful — spare, direct, lyrical, truthful. These are stories for all the senses, held in place by strands of memory alternately steel and gold.“Peter Damm’s stories about growing up in Michigan made me laugh aloud, cry, and occasionally wince when they hit too close to home. He infuses his stories with a deeply felt sense of place. The lakes and forests of his Michigan youth take on the presence of characters in his narrative. This is a lovely collection of stories, well conceived and beautifully told. The clean economy of the language and its cadences possess a quality that is almost poetic. Wild Blueberries is a gem of a book.”William Rodarmor—Award-winning journalist and translator“Peter Damm’s memoir, Wild Blueberries, is a joy to read. What emerges is a lyrical, rich and complex account of growing up in rural Michigan. The story of his Catholic coming of age is skeptical in tone, at times amusing, and yet we see how a sheltering tradition can comfort and unify. I read Wild Blueberries in two sittings, held by its directness and simplicity. It was a pleasure to be in the hands of an intelligent and generous author.”Leo Litwak—Guggenheim Fellow, winner of the Jewish National Book Award and the 1990 O. Henry Awards 1st Prize“Once Wild Blueberries is between bound covers, I will wear this book out to my heart’s content: keep it on my bedside table and dog-ear my favorite pages. In my work over the years, I have read at least 1,500 manuscripts. Only a handful have affected me in this way, in terms of the quality of the writing. I like the unaffected narrator who shares his search for an assembled, integrated version of the past, and conveys so clearly the idea that what counts here is the truth.”Susan Harper—Writer, longtime book editor and university Creative Writing instructor“In Wild Blueberries Peter Damm tenderly sketches out the delights and tribulations of a seemingly quiet Midwestern childhood. Wrestling with the riddles of his Catholic inheritance, we hear the questions of a smart, sensitive young man trying to puzzle out the mysteries of sin, sex, and spirit, and make sense of the adult world. There is a gentleness and humor to Damm’s stories that invites the reader to reflect on his or her own journey to maturity.” J. Ruth Gendler—Writer, artist, teacher. Author of The Book of Qualities

Peter Damm's life has traveled varied tracks. He was raised in small town, rural Michigan and graduated with Honors from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. He later studied with National Book Award winner Wright Morris, and with Guggenheim Fellow and National Jewish Book Award winner Leo Litwak in the Master's Creative Writing Program at San Francisco State University. He has lived abroad and traveled widely in Europe, India, Bali, Mexico, and parts of the Middle East, Indonesia, Central and South America, and New Zealand. He worked on the grounds crew of a golf course, as a banquet waiter, on road construction crews, the staffs of magazines, and as a freelance writer and editor. He has taught European travel classes, taught English language and American culture to Japanese university students, co-founded an import gourmet food business, was co-owner of a residential real estate brokerage, earned a doctorate degree in Clinical Psychology at the Wright Institute in Berkeley, and worked as a psychotherapist, grief counselor, and with families of the chronically mentally ill. His book of poems, At The Water's Edge, chronicles a 5-month journey in Bali, Indonesia and New Zealand. Peter lives and works in Berkeley, California.

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