Motherlines: Love, Longing, and Liberation - Paperback

by Patricia Reis (Author)

When she was twenty, Patricia Reis's mother asked, "What about your spiritual life?" Years later, this question drives her midlife quest to reconcile the desires of her body with the mandates of her spirit. Motherlines is a candid and compelling story of sex with men and with women, of celibacy, illegal abortions, making vows and breaking them, dreams, body wisdom, creative ambition, and inspiring relationships with memorable characters. This unflinching memoir illuminates the unvarnished truth of growing up female in the 1980's a rich and fertile period in American history when gender roles were undergoing a revolution, a time that includes feminism, the women's spirituality movement and liberation theology. In her soul-searching quest for meaning, and longing for maternal connection, Reis discovers an unlikely confidante in her aunt, a free-spirited Franciscan nun. Their letters and relationship are a thread that weaves throughout this memoir - an increasingly intimate and honest exchange between two women who are living very different lives yet are both kin and kindred spirits. A spiritual journey and a creative tour de force, this memoir is a potent and tender love song to the Motherlines that connect us all.

Author Biography

Patricia Reis is passionately interested in how creativity, depth psychology, and the natural world inform a woman's spiritual life. Along with numerous essays and reviews, Reis is the author of four books: Women's Voices (co-edited with Nancy Cater), which includes her in-depth interview with naturalist and writer Terry Tempest Williams; The Dreaming Way: Dreamwork and Art for Remembering and Recovery; Daughters of Saturn: From Father's Daughter to Creative Woman; and Through the Goddess: A Woman's Way of Healing. Reis holds a BA in English literature from the University of Wisconsin, an MFA from UCLA, and a degree in Depth Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara. She conducts a private psychotherapy practice, primarily for female artists and writers. Currently, she divides her time between Maine and Nova Scotia. Learn more at www.patriciareis.net.