Pieces of My Mother A Memoir Author:Melissa Cistaro One summer, Melissa Cistaro's mother left without explanation. Devastated, Melissa and her brothers were tormented by the thought: Why did their mother abandon them? Thirty-five years later, Melissa finds herself in Olympia, Washington, as her mother is dying. After decades of hiding painful memories, she has just days to find out what happened ... more »that summer and confront the fear she could do the same to her kids. But Melissa never expects to stumble across a cache of letters her mother wrote to her but never sent-- letters that could hold the answers she seeks. Alternating between Melissa's tumultuous coming-of-age and her mother's final days, this memoir reveals how we can survive our parents' choices and forge our own paths.« less