“Change is always possible. We don’t have to carry old stories of hardship around as a life sentence,” Lidia Yuknavitch tells PEOPLE ahead of her new memoir. This is the guiding ethic of the celebrated author and teacher, and one that many readers will find resonant.
But for her legions of fans who want to handle themselves else stories folks, a new entry in the Yuknavitch canon is on the way. Her new memoir, Reading wavesdue out from Riverhead Books in February 2025.
Readers may know Yuknavitch from her 2022 bestseller Confidenceher TED talk on the beauty of nonconformity or her stunning memoir Chronology of water, currently in production as an indie film directed by Kristen Stewart.
‘Reading the Waves’ by Lidia Yuknavitch.
Riverhead
20 Memoirs People Love – That Aren’t Written By Celebrities (Exclusive)
Reading waves she draws from her own life—a complicated childhood, the death of her daughter, past relationships with men and women—as well as her creative life to examine her broken heart and her loyalty to that identity, as well as explore new interpretations and possibilities. “I believe that our bodies are carriers of experience,” Yuknavitch writes in her book. “But the stories we tell ourselves about these experiences can trap us in the trauma we suffered along the way. What if we could discard those stories and open ourselves up to new possibilities by reshaping our memories and reshaping them on our terms? What if we could loosen the bonds that stifle the stories we tell, so that change can happen in our lives?”
The PEOPLE Puzzler has arrived! How fast can you solve it? Play now!
The cover, revealed exclusively to PEOPLE, was designed by Riverhead Associate Art Director Lauren Peters-Collaer, who incorporated Yuknavitch’s own handwriting into the design.
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(594x580:596x582)/Lidia-Yuknavitch-book-08022402-d0e6997b7b834e19ae3a43c11d938889.jpg)
Author and educator Lidia Yuknavitch.
Miles Mingo
“Reading waves is a riveting examination of storytelling, creativity and transformation,” she said in a statement shared with PEOPLE. “Lidia illuminates our ability to reinvent our own pasts to renew ourselves and move more freely.”
In what the publisher calls “alternately honest and lyrical, open and evocative,” Reading waves “reimagines memory while challenging us to question what we hold on to too tightly and what we must set in order to continue becoming,” the statement continued.
The best PEOPLE books of July 2024: Keanu Reeves and China Miéville’s genre-bending novel and more
It promises to be a fitting continuation of Yuknavitcha’s ongoing conversation with the literary world and her place in it.
“We can rearrange the story whenever we want, put ourselves in a different place in relation to the events, find useful elements to leave behind or take with us, go into history again and again and take different steps, create different paths,” Yuknavitch told PEOPLE. about writing this memoir.
Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.
“This idea that we can change the story is one that helps me understand the past, the present and the future,” she continues. “I’m a person who believes in storytelling as a real place, so I do what I know: join the legions of other storytellers as many times as necessary.”Reading waves will be published by Riverhead Books on February 4, 2025 and is available for pre-order now, wherever books are sold.
Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education