No Finer Place: A Memoir of DNA, Deception, and Duality (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781662961236)

Hyper-competent and hard-charging, Michelle is one of those "I don't know how she does it" women-the kind you don't know whether to envy or pity. But when a seismic DNA surprise at midlife loosens her white-knuckle grip on life, she learns the hard way that checklists don't heal and the only way forward is inward.

Ever unflappable, Michelle treats the discovery of identity-shattering family secrets as just another project to manage, thinking she can fool herself and others that she's not falling apart. She travels from the craggy coast of Maine to the South Carolina Lowcountry, Atlanta, Savannah, and Louisiana's bayous and Bible Belt, tracing her parents' coming of age against a backdrop of the Great Depression, World War II, racial segregation, and homophobia. Michelle expects answers to unfurl like Spanish moss off a live oak or float to the surface of a Sazerac but instead finds she's searching for all the wrong things in all the wrong places. No Finer Place: A Memoir of DNA, Deception, and Duality explores the universal longing to belong and our capacity to grow whole after life nearly breaks us.