Fig Tree acquires Peters’ ‘exquisitely moving’ debut novel The Berry Pickers

Fig Tree has acquired The Berry Pickers, the “exquisitely moving” debut novel by Indigenous Canadian writer Amanda Peters.

Ella Harold, assistant editor, bought UK and Commonwealth rights from Marilyn Biderman at the Transatlantic Agency, in her first acquisition for the imprint. The novel will be published in hardback on 2nd November 2023, in the same week as the US edition.

The Berry Pickers is described as “an exquisitely moving story of the persistence of hope and the power of family, even in the face of grief and betrayal”. It begins in 1960s Maine, when six-year-old Joe is the last person to see his little sister Ruthie before she disappears without a trace from the blueberry fields where their family, Mi’kmaq people from Nova Scotia, are picking fruit for the summer. For decades after that tragic day, Joe will grapple with grief and guilt.

Alternating with Joe’s chapters is the story of smart, precocious Norma, who is growing up as the only child of unhappy parents in an affluent suburb nearby. The synopsis adds: “Bursting with questions she isn’t allowed to ask – about her missing baby photos, and about the strange, vivid dreams of campfires and warm embraces that haunt her sleep night after night – Norma senses there are things her parents aren’t telling her. But it will take a lifetime to unravel the secrets they have kept buried since she was a little girl.”

Peters is a writer of Mi’kmaq and settler ancestry. She is the winner of the 2021 Indigenous Voices Award for Unpublished Prose and a participant in the 2021 Writers’ Trust Rising Stars programme. She is an associate professor in the Department of English and Theatre at Acadia University.

She said: “It is truly an honour to be considered among such remarkable artists and writers. I am eternally grateful for the team at Fig Tree for having faith in my little story and giving it the love every writer dreams of. I’m so excited for UK readers to discover my work.”

Biderman said: “Amanda’s deft storytelling, her groundedness in the stories of her people, and the importance of stories that highlight the legacy of colonial violence against Indigenous peoples give The Berry Pickers its extraordinary depth and power. I’m so thrilled that this brilliant novel has secured such a wonderful home at Fig Tree, and will be available to readers in the UK very soon.”

Harold added: “Brimming with feeling, The Berry Pickers is a powerful and poignant novel about family, hope and the agony of imagining life as it ought to have been. Told in a dual first-person narrative, it made me root for both Joe and Norma, and I was utterly enthralled as I followed them through many decades to their story’s deeply moving ending. Amanda Peters is a masterful writer, and I’m delighted to be bringing her wonderful debut to the Fig Tree list.”