![]() Mailhot’s father, Ken Mailhot, (who also went by Ken Paquette) was also Indigenous. ![]() Her mother was Nlaka’pamux and Mailhot’s maternal grandmother went to residential school, where she learned to clean and pray she became a devout Christian, but spoke little of her experiences there. ![]() Mailhot, 34, is Indigenous from the Seabird Island Band – that’s where she grew up, near Chilliwack, B.C. How could misfortune follow me so well, and why did I choose it every time?” “It’s too ugly – to speak this story,” she writes in the first chapter, Indian Condition. It’s a slim volume you can read in one sitting that wallops with its devastating story and its tremendous prose. The life she leads now is bliss – even without that other thing dominating their lives right now: Mailhot’s recently published debut book Heart Berries: A Memoir has earned rave reviews, made it to the New York Times bestsellers list, landed Mailhot a guest spot on The Daily Show and is a strong contender for the best Canadian book – best book, period – you will read this year. ![]() At times, the kids were left alone for days while their mother was at work and their father gone – off on a bender, or chased from the home, finally, for his violence. ![]() Her experience was broken families, abusive parents and hunger. Growing up in British Columbia in a house infested with ladybugs, abuse and neglect, Mailhot longed for a kind of ordinary life she didn’t really know existed, certainly not first-hand. ![]()
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