Nina St. Pierre

Jun 1, 2024 | bookreporter.com | Nina St. Pierre

At the very start of LOVE IS A BURNING THING, Nina St. Pierre reminds her readers that a memoir is not an autobiography but instead “a curated work of memory.” Her memories, she explains, have been curated in order to answer the question that has haunted her: “What was happening with my mother, and why didn’t, or couldn’t, I understand?” While many memoirs center on reflection or even explanation, St. Pierre’s does indeed focus on an attempt to understand.

May 28, 2024 | lithub.com | Nina St. Pierre

I was twelve. It was 1993 and we were in far rural northern California in a town called Weed that looked about like it sounded. It was winter, I think, which in 1993, still meant blizzards, and dirty snowbanks piled high at the edges of the road. In the distance, the sun set behind Mount Shasta, backlighting her ethereal silhouette in luminous oranges and pinks. Inside, I lingered outside Mom’s prayer-room door. I could just make out the low hum of her voice on the phone. She’d been doing this more.

May 9, 2024 | time.com | Nina St. Pierre

IdeasMay 9, 2024 7:00 AM EDTSt. Pierre is a queer essayist and culture writer whose work has appeared in Elle, GQ , Harper’s Bazaar, The Cut, Gossamer, Nylon, Outside, and more. She is a 2023 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Nonfiction Literature. She holds an MFA from Rutgers and lives in New York City. Love Is a Burning Thing is her first bookI had just arrived back in the States when I got the call.

May 7, 2024 | thebrunswicknews.com | Nina St. Pierre

Ten years before I was born, at 4:40 on the morning of Nov. 10, 1971, my mother and another woman sat "yogi-style" on the floor of an Ann Arbor, Michigan, kitchen and lit themselves on fire. They were just blocks from the University of Michigan campus, where my mother had been a student. She had just turned 20. Police tracked the smell of burning hair to find the women sitting on the floor, facing each other, screaming.

May 7, 2024 | miamiherald.com | Nina St. Pierre

Ten years before I was born, at 4:40 on the morning of Nov. 10, 1971, my mother and another woman sat "yogi-style" on the floor of an Ann Arbor, Michigan, kitchen and lit themselves on fire. They were just blocks from the University of Michigan campus, where my mother had been a student. She had just turned 20. Police tracked the smell of burning hair to find the women sitting on the floor, facing each other, screaming.