On Tuesday, Oct. 15, a crowd gathered around to listen to author, Kristine S. Ervin, at a reading of her memoir, “Rabbit Heart.”  

The event was held in Ronk Lecture Hall at The College of education building on campus. The reading was presented by The Department of Languages and Literatures Reading Series and sponsored by the Ashland Center for Nonviolence.  

“Rabbit Heart” is a devastatingly powerful memoir illustrating Ervin’s longing to find her own identity, while living through her family’s decades-long journey to find the two men that abducted and murdered her mother when the author was just eight years old. The story covers grief, motherhood, violence against women, and Ervin’s personal journey of transitioning into womanhood without her mother.  

“For me, from pretty early on, I needed to turn this brutality, this violence, this story, this trauma, this pain, this grief, into something that was beautiful,” said Ervin. 

 At the end of the two-hour gathering, Ervin answered questions and gave advice to those who hope to become future writers themselves, as well as those who have struggled with grief in their own lives. She gave one of the reasons that led to the creation of the memoir, “To build those connections where somebody else doesn’t feel so alone, and I don’t either” explained Ervin.