New memoir set in Duluth explores family stories, the solace of reading

DULUTH — Growing up in the same house doesn’t mean you lived the same story as your family.

We all have our own stories to tell.

Minnesota author and journalist Laurie Hertzel was a recent guest on the KAXE Morning Show to talk about her new memoir Ghosts of Fourth Street: My Family, a Death, and the Hills of Duluth.

Hertzel writes from the point of view of her 9-year-old self. One of 10 children, she found herself smack dab in the middle.

"I was sort of all by myself in this crowd. And I was also a very shy, introverted, kind of observant kid. So I spent a lot of time just sort of spying on people."

The book includes the sudden death of her older brother.

"This sounds goofy, but 9 was like a really good age to experience this kind of tragedy, because I was old enough to understand it and remember it, but I was not old enough to have fully developed emotions."

Hertzel remembers the loss, but in a different way than older siblings or her parents.

"I was not really enveloped in devastating grief."

At its core, the memoir goes beyond the death of a sibling, exploring the stories we tell and how they come to define us.

"My father used to tell stories about growing up in the Great Depression and what that was like. And then the stories we told each other. Because there was so much tension in the household, we kind of looked out for each other."

Hertzel's mother took her to the Duluth Public Library and books became a refuge, foreshadowing her career in journalism as the Minnesota Star Tribune books editor as well as an author. She found herself drawn to all the orphan stories like Anne of Green Gables and The Boxcar Children.

"Maybe I'm an orphan and I'll go find another place to live," she said.

It wasn't just the influence of library visits with her mother where she found solace in story. Hertzel said, "My father was an English professor and he had a room in the basement that he had fitted out with bookshelves."

She described the basement as creepy and unfinished with a large furnace.

"And then you went into this little room and it was just like this beautiful place." Hertzel found herself hiding there often, and reading for a sense of escape from the chaos of the family.

"It was a way of, at an early age, understanding there's a whole lot of different ways to live. And I think that's important for a child."

Listen to the full conversation above, with great descriptions of Hertzel's childhood Duluth and a discussion on the abundance of writers in the state of Minnesota.