This memoir is so beautiful and heartbreaking to read. Thistle covers all topics especially focused on drug use and homelessness. It definitely feels like he did not shy away from any topic good or bad. Loved to see the positive outcome of this person.

This was a powerful, compelling memoir. Jesse Thistle describes his journey from being abandoned by his parents, taken in by his grandparents, becoming homeless, struggling with addiction, and finally turning his life around. He doesn’t shy away from sharing some of his lowest moments. The descriptions that he provides of his childhood are absolutely gut-wrenching, and it is inspiring to learn about his journey. I would have liked to learn more about his relationships with his brothers as an adult - there were events that seemed to be skipped over that I would have liked to read about. Overall this is an inspiring story and I recommend it.

Jesse Thistle shares a raw real account of his struggles and life as an addict in Canada. This eye opening book really hit home for me and I appreciate how Thistle tackled a number of difficult topics with pose and respect.

A raw memoir of Jesse's life after he and his brothers were abandoned by their parents and eventually went to live with their grandparents. This covers Jesse's struggles with homelessness, addiction, and crime, and the very hard struggle to turn his life around.

This incredible memoir takes you on a journey through the absolutely amazing life of Jesse Thistle. Seeing his strength in the face of so many obstacles is a huge inspiration and I think this will really be a book people are talking about. I'm recommending it everyone I know.

Thank you NetGalley and Atria books for this ARC!

This memoir deserves all the praise it is receiving. It's beautifully written and paints such a vivid representation of the author's story, it's just stunning. I'm recommending it to everyone!

Thank you to Atria Books and Netgalley for a copy of the ARC in return for my honest opinion.

WOW what a journey From the Ashes took me on. I can honestly say that I KNOW that reading this book by Jesse Thistle really impacted my life and will stay with me for a very long time. The topic of homelessness and addiction is one that is usually heartbreaking and hopeless but this memoir is full of hope. Yes there is a ton of heartbreak, sad and darkness in this book but Jesse’s journey is truly up lifting and should be shared with all!
Thank you so much to Jesse Thistle for being so raw, honest and open. Giving a view into the mind of an addict would help so many people who are dealing with love ones that are addicts.

What a journey! I am thankful I came into this reading knowing that Thistle was a professor and historian, because at so many points during this memoir I felt hopeless. This is a must read for anyone who loves someone who copes with addiction or homelessness. It is terrifying and heartbreaking to walk through Thistle's journey with him and to accept how pain and suffering he needs to go through before he is able to make the decision that his life is worth it, but gives great insight into what goes on in the mind of someone in active addiction. I am thankful that Thistle entered recovery and is happy and healthy these days.

4.5 stars! Wow, this book is a powerful one and it will stick with me for a very long time. The fact that Jesse lived to tell his heartbreaking but triumphant story is a miracle in itself. Thanks to NetGalley and Atria Books for the ARC in exchange for my honest review!

A brutal account of Jesse Thistle life as an addict to alcohol and drugs. His road to recovery was long and I thought could of been more detailed. The book focused more on his escapades to find his next fix. It was remarkable with all his injuries and drug related episodes he was able to survive and write a book and become educated.

This was a hard read. Jesse Thistle has an important story to tell, with family violence showing up on the very first page. The rest of the books is full of his detailed memories growing up Metis-Cree in Canada, and of parental neglect, child abuse, homelessness, abandonment, addiction, and imprisonment. Needless to say, content warnings would be appreciated by many readers.

I wanted to like the book. I appreciate authors who can tell the gritty parts of their own stories, and a few of Thistle's memories are so lyrically rendered it's easy to imagine oneself right there, too. But for most of the book, my reading experience felt detached. I didn't feel connected to the author, even though the photos scattered throughout helped a little.

This was a stunning memoir of Jesse Thistle's trauma, courage, and relationships. I was impressed with the honesty and bravery with which Jesse tells his story. The story is intense, extraordinary, and stomach-turning. I loved the writing style with the short chapters and powerful poetry intertwined.

I don't necessarily feel right trying to rate this book as it is so deeply personal but I will do my best to explain my thoughts. In general, I would rate this 5/5 because it was captivating and most of all Jesse's bravery in sharing his story and pain can be felt through each page. On a personal level, I would rate this a 4.5/5 star because I was hoping for a little more detail on how felt turning his life around, dealing with guilt for past mistakes, and reconnecting with family and his heritage. Nonetheless, I think this is a must read for everyone. Just make sure you look up trigger warnings ahead of time as there are a lot of them!

“Once, in a not-too-distant life I was a different person. It was a dark time, loveless, cold, violent. A time when I no longer cared about the world, a world that had taken so much and left me with nothing.”

FROM THE ASHES is an incredible memoir from Jesse Thistle, a Métis-Cree from Saskatchewan who was abandoned as a child by his parents. @czechmet shares his journey from foster care to the streets and shelters to jail, a story of heartbreaking addiction and destruction but ultimately one of resilience and second chances. this was a bestselling book in Canada last year and is now being published here in the US! if you enjoy memoirs, this is definitely one to pick up!

This is by far the most powerful story I have read all year.

Content Warning: addiction, drug use, sexual abuse, death, descriptive depiction of injuries

From the Ashes is a memoir written by Metis scholar, Jesse Thistle, that speaks on his past living with addiction and struggling with homelessness. This book is a mix of poems and Thistle's recollection of his life. This book was captivating and I enjoyed the authenticity and blunt nature of the writing.

The author's recollection of his life displays how generational trauma, and as a result, family dysfunction and separation, can really have a negative effect on a developing child's growth and mindset. Thistle's perspective highlights how seemingly small events overtime in his life ultimately led to addiction, homelessness, and crime. His narrative also touches on how Indigenous peoples face higher rates of personal and systemic discrimination, ultimately leading to disproportionate representation in social institutions such as the child welfare, and the criminal justice system. Most of the author's storytelling is him recalling horrific details of the experiences in his life. I really appreciated how the author bluntly described his life events to enlighten readers of the reality of addiction and homelessness.
This book makes you really think of the people that society often sweeps under the rug, and how they are more or less experiencing the same things that Jesse was in this book.

The last part of this book speaks on Jesse's story of resilience and it is quite remarkable. From barely being able to take care of himself, to becoming a PhD candidate and professor at York university - it is incredibly inspiring and eye opening that you can evoke so much change and growth within yourself, even in the most extreme cases of adversity. It is also great how Jesse was able to connect with his Metis roots and understand and learn more about his Indigenous identity. Jesse Thistle has dedicated his studies to researching his Indigenous identity and being an advocate for the homeless. I will always recommend this book to anyone and everyone, and believe this is a really important story to be told.

Thank you Netgalley and Artia for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This book is already available in Canada, but will be published in the US on June 08, 2021.

Jesse Thistle's memoir is written in vignettes and Jesse's writing is honest and raw. He shares about his life growing up, the foster system, his grandparents who took him in and how he became an addict and homeless. As Thistle describes his early years and life on the streets, which is anything but kind, I heard the voices of some of my own people in my head who have had to live in survival mode for way too long.

Jesse shows how resourceful he is, his street smarts, and how difficult it is to deal with the demons inside us every day. Okay, so this might sound intense and a downer, but bear with me. It definitely deals with heavy topics: racism, addiction, homelessness, treatment of First Nations people living in Canada, foster care, crime, abuse... you get the idea. The brilliance of the memoir is that it offers hope. It shows how a man can look inside himself to find out who he really is and do what it takes to become that person. This isn't easy. In fact, it's damn hard, but Jesse shows us it's possible.

There were pages that were so intense, I'd be holding my breath and then a few paragraphs later, I'd find myself chuckling at Thistle's witty humour, and laughed out loud about his wall of soap. He expresses himself well and is brave enough to share his story that many people can relate to. My hope is that we will also learn from his experiences and it will only better our country.

This was such an intense memoir. Jesse Thistle had a rough life, and from him to go from where he was to where he is now is astounding. It's a short, easy read that will make you think about the people who slip through the cracks. I do wish that Jesse had been more introspective throughout, though. He got a little introspective at the end, but he spent most of the book being awful to his family, friends, and strangers. While it's obvious he regrets his behavior, he doesn't spend any time dwelling on any of it. I mean, his grandparents shun him and I honestly thought they went above and beyond trying to help him, and Jesse the teenager was being a huge ass to everyone around them, and he never really reconciles with his culpability with this. (I understand his childhood trauma is a BIG reason he was like this. But trauma doesn't give people an out to be consistently awful to the people who love them, and even though he was a teenager, Jesse the author never owns up to his end, either).

His writing style was a little rough, but highly effective. I personally dislike when memoirs do really early child years with very vivid detail, and this one did that too, but it worked better than normal because his childhood was pretty awful, making me think these specific instances were burned into his memory. But other than those early chapters, I thought he was brutally honest and Jesse is incredibly resilient to go through all that he did and decide to turn his life back around and graduate school.

My complaints, though, are nitpicks to an incredible story. Highly recommend.

I always find rating memoirs a bit tricky, it's someone's life story so I tend to focus on the writing style and technique instead. But with this memoir I was blown away, by Jesse's courage, by the heartbreak and suffering that he endured, and that he eventually found salvation in his culture and with his family.

My heart broke for Jesse throughout this memoir. I had to keep reminding myself that this was real, this happened. My mind wanted to believe it was fiction, that someone hadn't faced all of these things in their life, but I know it's true not only for Jesse but for too many across Canada.

You cannot uncouple Jesse's story to that of systematic racism and discrimination. The statistics in Canada are alarming. Indigenous people are both more likely to be the victims and the perpetrators of crime. They are more likely to be incarcerated. The legacy of residential schools, and other racist and discriminatory policies runs deep for Indigenous communities.

Jesse's writing was powerful and devastating. I read the whole memoir in one session, my eyes glued to the page. Even when I felt emotionally overwhelmed I could not put it down. I would like to thank him for sharing his story with the world. You are an inspiration of strength. Miigwetch.

A special thank you to Netgalley and Atria Books for the ARC in advance of the US publication.

Searching for my Existence

Jessie and his brothers were abandoned by their parents and he walked in his father's shadow. His grandparents took the boys in and raised them. Grandparents love their grandchildren and I know his grandparents loved him. The Grandparents have raised their children, they are older now and set in their ways. They try but I think they probably resent the parents not caring for their children and the responsibility falling to them. They are afraid that Jessie will follow in his father's footsteps, which he does, and they do not want him to take his brother's with him.

At a young age Jessie finds alcohol and drugs. His choices lead him to becoming an addict. His family , his brother's try to help, and friends try to help, but the lure of the drug is too strong and he doesn't have the will to fight it. It makes life easier and after a while it is his way of life. The darkness overtakes him and he is lost for a while.

He struggles and at times he tries to do better and to get out of the life, but it sucks him back in and he is once again lost. The horrors of addiction are real, the struggle to become clean and sober again is an insurmountable hope.

Thanks to caring people, and tremendous courage, he finally breaks free and rebuilds his life. The scars he carries with him both physical and metal will be with him forever. I think that for a very long time he will fight the demons and the darkness of drug addiction.

I am glad that he is back in the arms of his family and has a relationship with his aunt, his mother and his relatives. His story is truly one of pain, hopelessness and finally hope and love. I thanks Jessie for sharing it.

Thanks to Jessie Thistle, Atria Books, and NetGalley for allowing me to read a copy for an honest review.

Such an important read for everyone. This book is inspiring and breath-taking. Thank you Jesse for sharing your story. Special thanks to NetGalley, publisher, and author for this advance reading copy.