The honesty in this book, about everything from consensual adultery to mixed emotions, makes it a riveting read. That a mother ask a daughter to write her biography is perhaps not unusual; but in this case, when that mother is herself both an intriguing woman and a professional writer accustomed to documenting rich, sometimes shocking details, and the daughter is as compassionate and insightful as Maggie Ziegler, the resulting story is outstanding. This intelligent book records not only a mother's fascinating story, but a daughter's act of great love and devotion. This is the best book I've read all year!
Pearl Luke, author of award winning novels Madame Zee and Burning Ground. "'Write everything down,' says Maggie Ziegler's elderly mother at the beginning of this wonderful and touching book. The reader is transported into Mary's complex past and then beyond it, into a place where fact and imagination merge. This is a compelling story and a work of love."
Kathy Page, author of Alphabet and The Find.
"I didn't want this book to end. It is an engaging story told with compassion and insight. Maggie Ziegler is a gifted psychotherapist and a wonderful writer who has applied her craft to that most difficult of subjects, her own family. The result is a complex, genuine and sensitive interweaving of the lives of a mother and a daughter that combines psychological depth with fantastic story telling."
Laurie Anne Pearlman, Ph.D., Clinical psychologist
"Maggie Ziegler's autobiographical memoir is a brave journey into a family past set on three continents. From Britain to Africa to Canada, The Road to Keringet is the remarkable story of how a daughter's promise in the face of her mothers' decline leads to discovery and the acceptance of loss."
Dianne Warren, author of the Governor General's Award winning novel Cool Water
I really loved this story...so many layers...internal and external landscapes beautifully woven through the voices of a complex relationship between mother and daughter...from the authors’ childhood, through her mother's dementia and eventual death. History of women's lives in World War II told through the detailed personal journals of Maggie Ziegler's mother. The author moves seamlessly back and forth in time from her own voice to that of her mother. Real. Disturbing. Emotional. Funny. Sad. True. A courageous "...best truth that I have been able to invent."
Anita Roberts, author of Safe-Teen
I've just finished this book, after a couple of can't-put-it-down evenings. It does what the best memoirs do – permits the reader to look deep inside the author and her family, blemishes and all. By doing so, the author has allowed me, the reader, the freedom to view my life in equally honest terms. Painful sometimes, but what a gift…At some point, this story becomes our story. Everybody's got a family and everybody's got death in the wings. Not everybody has the courage to write about these things with the perception and self-knowledge that Maggie Ziegler has. I feel enriched.
Peter Schnitzler, artist and filmmaker
This book is wonderful. Really and truly, it was difficult to put it down, and I was looking forward to getting to it again. That is not that common with a book as substantive, real, and human as this book. What a tribute to her mother the author has written. A tribute to her for having written it.
Ervin Staub, professor
I loved so much about this book. I loved the style in which it is written, in both the author and her mother’s voices. I loved the author’s exploration of the complexities of her mother’s life and experience, her deepened awareness and appreciation of whom her mother is/was, and the glimpses into wartime experiences.
Tina Schoen, coordinator, woman's shelter
