Nita Sweeney is the bestselling author of five books including the award-winning memoir Depression Hates a Moving Target: How Running with My Dog Brought Me Back from the Brink. Her work on mindfulness, movement, and mental health has been featured in the Wall Street Journal. A mindfulness coach, certified meditation teacher, ultramarathoner, and retired attorney, Nita knows firsthand the power of showing up for yourself and for those you love even when it feels impossible. Based on her work as assistant to writing practice originator Natalie Goldberg, Nita founded Mind, Mood, and Movement to support well-being through meditation, movement, and writing practice and The Writer's Mind to assist writers in chasing their publication dreams. Nita lives in central Ohio with her husband, Ed, and their yellow Labrador retriever, Scarlet, not far from the golf courses where many of the events in MEMORIAL took place.
Sweeney leans in close to show the reality of a difficult year. Then, she drops us all the way in, creating a book that will echo with you long after you close the cover.-Natalie Goldberg, best-selling author of Writing Down the Bones and Writing on Empty ... a heartbreaking (yet sometimes comical) story that is brutally honest about suicidal ideation, grief, love, and what it actually takes to keep going.-Gabe Howard, Webby award-winning podcaster and author of Mental Illness Is an Asshole and Other Observations ... a glorious memoir that will touch you deeply and resonate for many years after its last page.-James Dodson, award-winning author of Final Rounds and The Road That Made America ... an emotional tribute to the power of sports in forging unbreakable bonds and transforming fairways into pathways of reconciliation and unconditional love.-Leif H. Smith, Psy.D, Clinical & Sports Psychologist and author of Sports Psychology for Dummies ... an inspiring and hopeful memoir about fathers and daughters, healing familial relationships, and recovering from mental illness. A darned good read!-Sean Murphy, recent National Endowment for the Arts Fellow in Creative Writing, award-winning author of The Time of New Weather ... a fitting tribute to her father while showing his significance in her life ... touching, funny, poignant, and honest. It effectively weaves different timelines with many vivid scenes on and off the golf course. It would make a terrific movie!-James Kingsland, author of Am I Dreaming? and Siddhartha's Brain ... a touching exploration of the mind and heart. Sweeney holds nothing back as she shines a light on mental illness, self-destruction, and grief, all in a way that compels our compassion.-Debbie Russell, award-winning author of Crossing Fifty-One: Not Quite a Memoir Sweeney's prose is straightforward and to the point, sharing her vulnerable emotions as she examines how her father's sickness impacts her own self-image as well as her future. Sweeney's depression is intensely rendered, sweeping readers into her emotions and thought processes, and her inner monologues when spending time with her father-reflecting on her insecurities, fear of losing him, and frustration that nothing can be done to save him-will strike a chord with readers.-Publisher's Weekly BookLife Prize Critic