About the Book
Griefland. It's a place no one wants to visit-a place without borders where language is inadequate and pain is constant. It's a place where every morning, one awakens to the stark reality that a loved one will never be seen, heard-or embraced-again. This is a place that Armen Bacon and Nancy Miller know all too well, for both of them, when they met, had lost a child to drug addiction. Both of them had also enjoyed a comfortable, middle-class life-until it was rocked by the sudden death of a son Alex, and a daughter, Rachel.
Griefland provides an intimate portrait of what tragedy does to the human soul, how it changes one's life, and most important, how it can be survived. With achingly beautiful language, this book explores the acute moment-to-moment experience of grief. But it also transcends that and speaks to the redemptive power of friendship, trust, intimacy, and love. Together they discover a will and desire to move forward, recognizing that life is the ultimate prize for those who survive this excruciating journey.
About the Author :
Armen Bacon made her authorial debut with the powerful memoir, Griefland: An Intimate Portrait of Love, Loss and Unlikely Friendship (Globe Pequot Press, 2012). Her new book, My Name is Armen - A Life in Column Inches (The Press at California State University, Fresno, 2014), is based on a decade's worth of essays, many of them originally written as columns for The Fresno Bee. She writes about family and her Armenian roots, friends, love/loss, life travels and sacred advice gathered along life's wondrous journey. Her writing has appeared in Maria Shriver's Architects for Change, The Fresno Bee, Central Valley Magazine, The Armenian Reporter and Asbarez. Currently an op-ed columnist for The Fresno Bee, Armen is busy working on her next book project titled, Daring to Breathe.
Nancy Miller (1955- ) was born in Fresno, California, to an Armenian father and Irish/German mother (nee Josephine). She grew up in the Central Valley, graduating from California State University, Fresno in 1999 with a master's degree in English Literature. She has taught English and literature at the college and university levels since 1996 and served for more than six years as managing editor for The Business Journal in Fresno. Her first book, Griefland: An Intimate Portrait of Love, Loss and Unlikely Friendship, co-authored with Armen Bacon, makes its debut in October, 2012. She lives in Olympia, Washington.
Review :
Armen Bacon and Nancy Miller...courageously write their way into the darkest of the dark nights and they refuse to blink. Their writing takes us deep into pain without apology. They are relentless in their prose, in their honesty...Bacon and Miller have survived, continue to survive, and have rendered their journey in a poetic prose that is both heartbreaking and inspiring.
-- "Doug Rice, author of Dream Memoirs"
By exploring Griefland together, Armen Bacon and Nancy Miller remind us that the only way to traverse this terrain, so studded with landmines and bottomless chasms, is to hold someone's hand. A journey through Griefland is not a welcome passage, but discovering that you don't have to make it alone makes each step a little easier.
-- "Carla Malden, author of AfterImage"
It's the tragedy no one wants to imagine: the death of our child. These moms had me from the first chapter. From the honesty of their raw pain to the ways they helped each other through words that spoke of memories, anger, comfort, and eventual acceptance, I fell in love with the children they lost and the friendship they forged. You will learn, empathize, shed tears, share a laugh-and, if you need it, find comfort from the beautiful words that helped these two authors heal themselves and each other. Full of insight, emotion, and unforgettable images that honor the process of parenting and the value of connection.
-- "Randye Kaye, author of Ben Behind His Voices: One Family's Journey from the Chaos of Schizophrenia to Hope"
Loss and grief are definitive in the human condition, and the loss of achild trumps all. In Griefland, Armen Bacon and Nancy Miller conjure an anatomy of loss, and the grim climb back to a livable life after it, even though those lives will be forever changed.
-- "Leslie Heywood, author of Pretty Good for a Girl and The Proving Grounds"
