Get Rooted: Reclaim Your Soul, Serenity, and Sisterhood Through the Healing Medicine of the Grandmothers

Media executive Moreno (Practically Posh) details in this affecting spiritual memoir how she reconnected with her Mexican heritage and became a folk healer. Struggling to balance work and family, Moreno was having a “full-on midlife meltdown” when her cousin introduced her to curanderismo, “a Mesoamerican earth-based healing practice.” Moreno quit her job to become a curandera (folk healer) and embarked on a 260-day “healing journey” (“symbolic of the gestation period of a baby”) during which she had to confront the susto (“soul loss”) she suffered after her father’s death when she was 13 and discover her Ser (or “true essence”). To do so, she traced her father’s lineage to Coahuila, Mexico, learned Aztec herbalism, and participated in a healing ritual in a Belizean cave. Each chapter includes such exercises as connecting with one’s ancestors through meditation and writing a farewell letter to the thing or person of which one needs to let go. Through personal anecdotes and pained introspection, the author maintains a frank and open disposition that readers will find stirring. The result is a restorative testament to family and heritage. Agent: Johanna Castillo, Writers House. (June)

Correction: An earlier version of this review incorrectly stated that the author traced her father's lineage to an Indigenous tribe in Mexico.