"This shattering memoir...combines image and text to reveal a portrait of home.” (Elle)

“A candid and achingly fractured memoir of [Danielle Geller’s] mother, her family, her Navajo heritage and her own journey to self-discovery and acceptance.” (Ms.) 

“Dog Flowers by Danielle Geller is a journey story we’ve never read before. Geller travels through snippets of her own life and that of her mother’s, creating a narrative where all roads lead to her mother’s home in the Navajo Nation. It’s an honest, intimate, and heart-wrenching memoir that explores fractured family, the damaging effects of alcoholism and poverty, and what it means to seek healing from legacies of trauma. This book gave me chills. Trained as a librarian and archivist, Geller has created a type of archive, a living collection of memories and documents that speak to a life that is at once precisely individualistic while also being universally resonant. Read this book.” (Kali Fajardo-Anstine, author of Sabrina & Corina) 

“A Navajo woman’s memoir of family, loss, and self-discovery. [Danielle Geller] takes readers on two parallel journeys: that of her mother, Laureen, who left the Navajo reservation at age 19, 'almost as soon as she could', and her own, which begins with her notifying her sister Eileen that their mother was dying.... After Laureen’s death, Geller collected her mother’s belongings, 'packed into eight suitcases' and including 'her diaries, her photos, and the letters she kept'. Using these personal items, the author expertly weaves her story into Laureen’s.... Geller’s mix of archival research and personal memoir allows readers to see a refreshing variety of perspectives and layers, resulting in an eye-opening, moving narrative. A deftly rendered, powerful story of family, grief, and the search for self.” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review)