A Washington Post “Most Anticipated” Book of the Year • A New York Times “Must Read” For readers of My Dark Places and The Fact of a Body , a beautiful, brutal memoir documenting one woman’s search for identity alongside her family's decades-long quest to identify the two men who abducted—and murdered—her mother "Melding true crime with memoir, Ervin reminds us of what happens when we conflate people with the transgressions committed against them—the collateral damage we inflict when we turn human beings into moral allegory . . . A powerful treatise on love and loss, on mothers and daughters, but it is also a warning to all of us who consume true crime." — The New York Times Book Review Kristine S. Ervin was just eight years old when her mother, Kathy Sue Engle, was abducted from an Oklahoma mall parking lot and violently murdered in an oil field. First, there was grief. Then the desire to know: what happened to her, what she felt in her last terrible moments, and all she was before these acts of violence defined her life. In her mother’s absence, Ervin tries to reconstruct a woman she can never fully grasp—from her own memory, from letters she uncovers, and from the stories of other family members. As more information about her mother's death comes to light, Ervin’s drive to know her mother only intensifies, winding into her own fraught adolescence. She reckons with contradictions of what a woman is allowed to be—a self beyond the roles of wife, mother, daughter, victim—what a “true” victim is supposed to look like, and, finally, how complicated and elusive justice can be. Told fearlessly and poetically, Rabbit Heart weaves together themes of power, gender, and justice into a manifesto of grief and reclamation: our stories do not need to be simple to be true, and there is power in the telling. Shortlisted for the Reading the West Book Awards Finalist for the Clara Johnson Award A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice The New York Times , A New Book to Read This March Named a Best Book by Reader's Digest , Elle , The New Yorker , People , Oprah Daily, and CrimeReads Named a Most Anticipated Book by The Washington Post , Elle , PureWow , Bookshop , and Kirkus Reviews "A devastating account from the other side of murder, outlining in stark detail the trauma we fail to recognize when we consume tragedy as entertainment . . . Melding true crime with memoir, Ervin reminds us of what happens when we conflate people with the transgressions committed against them—the collateral damage we inflict when we turn human beings into moral allegory. She asks, too, what it means to live in a world where even death does not spare women’s bodies from the indignity of surveillance . . . Rabbit Heart is a powerful treatise on love and loss, on mothers and daughters, but it is also a warning to all of us who consume true crime." —Alissa Bennett, The New York Times Book Review "A heartfelt memoir . . . [T]his daughter’s tribute will stand as a passionate, powerful memorial." —Kate Tuttle, The Boston Globe "[Ervin] follows the case with devastating rigor, shingling its developments with her memories of growing up without a mother." — The New Yorker "[A] poetic, moving memoir." — People "This graceful resulting memoir wrestles with failures of justice; the nuances of gendered violence; and the difficulty of making do when we are not whole." —Lauren Puckett-Pope, Elle "In a personal story interwoven with research, Ervin painstakingly works to reconstruct a woman she can never fully grasp from her own memory—instead, she pulls from letters she uncovers, and from the stories of other family members. Her drive to know her mother intensifies over the years winding into her own fraught adolescence. Candid and brave, she reckons with the contradictions of what a woman is allowed to be—a self beyond the roles of wife, mother, daughter, and victim . . . Rabbit Heart sheds light on the ways women confront violence and gender power dynamics in our everyday lives and encourages us to take back our voices by refusing to remain silent." —Leslie Absher, Ms. “Ervin's courage is breathtaking, her truth-telling a gift to women everywhere, and her story ends by landing a jaw-dropping cosmic punch that you will never see coming.” —Marion Winik, Oprah Daily "A beautifully written, immersive read . . . [T]his inaugural book from poet and essayist Ervin feels like such a punch to the gut. As you read through her gracefully composed pages on her unmoored girlhood and growth past the age her own mother was when she was taken, we realize that her story is the story of every family from all those anthology episodes we turn on while we knit or fold laundry or run." —Eve Batey, Reality Blurred "The memoir in general rejects simple statements and always finds a way to root itself in complexity . . . Ervin’s poetic and nuanced writing style is immersive and deeply rewarding." —Caitlin Thomson, T