Unearthing: A Story of Tangled Love and Family Secrets

WINNER OF THE 2023 GOVERNOR GENERAL'S LITERARY AWARD FOR NONFICTION

For readers of Crying in H Mart and Wintering, an unforgettable memoir about a family secret revealed by a DNA test, the lessons learned in its aftermath, and the indelible power of love.

Three months after Kyo Maclear’s father dies in December 2018, she gets the results of a DNA test showing that she and the father who raised her are not biologically related. Suddenly Maclear becomes a detective in her own life, unravelling a family mystery piece by piece, and assembling the story of her biological father. Along the way, larger questions arise: what exactly is kinship? And what does it mean to be a family?

Thoughtful in its reflections on race and lineage, unflinching in its insights on grief and loyalty, Unearthing is a captivating and propulsive story of inheritance that goes beyond heredity. 

What gets planted, and what gets buried? What role does storytelling play in unearthing the past and making sense of a life? Can the humble act of tending a garden provide common ground for an inquisitive daughter and her complicated mother? As it seeks to answer these questions, Unearthing bursts with the very love it seeks to understand.

KYO MACLEAR is an award-winning novelist, essayist, and children's author. Her books have been translated into eighteen languages and published in over twenty-five countries. She is the author of the hybrid memoir Birds Art Life (2017), winner of the Trillium Book Award. Kyo holds a doctorate in environmental humanities and is on faculty at the University of Guelph Creative Writing MFA.

ISBN: 9781039006706
Format: Hardback
Pages: 408
Publisher: Knopf Canada
Published: April 18, 2023

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

WINNER OF THE 2023 GOVERNOR GENERAL'S LITERARY AWARD FOR NON-FICTION

NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD FINALIST

A GLOBE AND MAIL BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR

“In recursive, often incantatory prose, Maclear meditates on the fragile nature of kinship and memory. A finely plotted and intricate narrative, Unearthing reimagines the garden metaphor and explores the porous grounds of self, culture and belonging. This quiet, arresting work softens the line between memoir and philosophy.” —Peer assessment committee for the 2023 Governor General’s Literary Award for Nonfiction: KatłĮà Lafferty, Lorri Neilsen Glenn and Rinaldo Walcott