Elegant and juicy ... Storytelling unafraid of poetry. Like a pudding, the prose here is both plain and rich ... It’s a lot, but it’s also gratifyingly lush. Griffiths gives us romance and romanticism.
The book is simultaneously a love story, a portrait of sisterhood and a visceral depiction of violence, loss and emotional devastation ... As one might expect from an author whose primary medium is poetry, the writing is evocative, full-bodied, perhaps a little overcooked in parts ... Goes to some dark places, but there is joy, too.
Lyrical and life-affirming ... Powerful, desperate and, occasionally, a little frustrating ... The book is a strange combination of open and raw, but shrouded in mystery too ... Frustrating.
Deeply felt ... Griffiths writes with great candor and bravery about the mental-health challenges that have dogged her throughout her life—depression, a suicide attempt in her 20s, and dissociative identity disorder. But while one admires the put-it-all-out-there quality that infuses her work, things sometimes feel a bit overworked and overwritten.
Griffiths is nothing if not painstakingly discreet. She offers brief glints of their relationship rather than a piercing searchlight ... Her style bears a characteristically American earnestness, consisting in large part of wispy, lyrical passages that feel in places as if they belong in a self-help manual ... An interesting footnote to Rushdie’s own story, but not what anyone would call essential. More specificity, and a few less adjectives, would have made for a far more rewarding read.
Records Griffiths’ horror and despair in the aftermath of each, but the memoir is not without hope. It is a howling proclamation of survival. Lovers of memoir and of achingly beautiful prose should not miss The Flower Bearers.
Stunning ... With grace and soft humor, Griffiths charts a path through devastation: poetic, heartbreaking, and life-affirming, this grief-streaked self-portrait makes a major impression.
