ROSANNE ANNONI & SANDRA MAITRI
About this Event
SANTA ROSA --
Copperfield's Books welcomes author, psychotherapist, and spiritual teacher Rosanne Annoni to Santa Rosa in celebration of her moving debut memoir — Unfolding the Heart: One Woman's Quest for True Nature!
Rosanne will be joined in conversation by Sandra Maitri, Santa Rosa author, teacher, and longtime practitioner of the Diamond Approach.
Join us for an intimate evening of reading and conversation exploring healing, grief, spiritual awakening, and the lifelong search for our truest selves, followed by an audience Q&A and book signing with photo opportunities.
This event is free and open to the public. Registration recommended for seating.
For fans of memoirs by spiritual seekers and therapists, a contemporary memoir of healing, loss, and awakening set between East Coast retreats and everyday life.
"Touching and honest; we can journey with her as she opens each door of healing and discovery." — Jack Kornfield, cofounder of Spirit Rock meditation center and author of Path With Heart
At the age of ten, Rosanne Annoni had a vision of Christ calling her to become a nun—only to have her devout Catholic mother respond to this news with a slap across the face. Traversing the time between that childhood vision and a solitary winter in Pema Chodron’s cabin at Gampo Abbey, Unfolding the Heart weaves together raw personal storytelling, spiritual discovery, and psychological insight. Through the highs of spiritual clarity and the depths of trauma, she searches relentlessly for her true path—and finds it not in renunciation, but in presence.
Spanning decades of grief, motherhood, cancer, and healing, this memoir explores the messy beauty of a life lived with courageous self-inquiry. Through the Diamond Approach, Buddhist practice, and deep personal relationships, Rosanne unearths wisdom from adversity and uncovers grace in the ordinary. For spiritual seekers, healing professionals, or anyone navigating loss, midlife change, or a desire for inner truth, Unfolding the Heart is a cathartic, hopeful story of letting go, leaning in, and discovering that spiritual path isn’t somewhere far away—it’s right here, within.
Author: Rosanne Annoni was a successful psychotherapist for thirty-five years in the Bay Area before becoming an ordained teacher of the Diamond Approach in 2000. She has taught students and mentored teachers in the United States, the UK, and the EU. In 2024, she was awarded an Emerging Writer Fellowship from Aspen Words. She is married, has one son, and lives with her husband and dog on Cape Cod.
Sandra Maitri was a member of the first group of students to whom the Chilean psychiatrist Claudio Naranjo presented the enneagram system in the U.S. almost three decades ago. In addition to her work with Naranjo, she has studied with various Eastern and Western spiritual and psychological teachers, including A.H. Almaas, founder of the contemporary spiritual path, the Diamond Approach. As one of the principal and supervising teachers of the Diamond Approach, she teaches the enneagram as part of the larger work of personal transformation, working with hundreds of students each year in the U.S. and Europe. She lives in Santa Rosa, California.
Praise:
"Rosanne Annoni takes us with her on her quest for true nature, navigating childhood wounds, missteps and misadventures, marriage and motherhood, and friendship and grief with honesty, grace, and forgiveness. We can all learn from Annoni as we, too, stumble through our messy lives on our own paths to true nature ." — Ann Hood, New York Times best-selling author of The Knitting Circle
"To want to find out what you are and to somehow bring what you learn to your work, to your mothering, to your friendships, to the way you love and grieve and live out each day . . . This is the path Rosanne has followed and the essence of the stories she shares." —Sherry Ruth Anderson, author of The Feminine Face of God and The Cultural Creatives
"In Unfolding the Heart, therapist, teacher, and spiritual explorer Rosanne Annoni contemplates her life with the curiosity and compassion of her profession and the candor the genre demands. In the process, she contemplates life's big questions and gently invites her readers to do the same." — Anne D. LeClaire, author of Listening Beneath the Noise
"Rosanne Annoni's beautiful and inspiring memoir is the story of how she fulfilled her calling to live a life devoted to God, but not in the way she imagined. It's a story about love, loss, forgiveness and making peace with the imprints of one's history--forging a life lived with an open heart, in the world but not of it." — Sandra Maitri, author of The Spiritual Dimension of the Enneagram
"In prose as inviting as a perfect cup of tea, Rosanne Annoni has crafted a spiritual autobiography documenting her lifelong journey in the direction of reconciliation and understanding. She is exacting, forgiving, and good-humored. Her generous spirit will prove infectious for readers inclined to conduct their own similar moral inventory, as they witness hers, with the same positive results." — Madeleine Blais, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of Queen of the Court and Uphill Walkers
"As a writer, I can think of nothing more challenging than putting into words one's complex and sometimes ambiguous spiritual path. Yet Rosanne Annoni has done just that, with great beauty, insight, and compassion. Unfolding the Heart is a welcome and necessary memoir for our turbulent times." — Ken Harvey, author of The Book of Casey Adair
"An intimate, beautifully observed journey into solitude and spiritual awakening--and the bravery of staying present." — Martha McPhee, professor of English at Hofstra University and author of Gorgeous Lie
"As a writer, I can think of nothing more challenging than putting into words one's complex and sometimes ambiguous spiritual path. Yet Rosanne Annoni has done just that with great beauty, insight and compassion. Unfolding the Heart is a welcome and necessary memoir for our turbulent times." — Ken Harvey, author of The Book of Casey Adair
"This book's intimacy and honesty took me by surprise, as I marveled at Rosanne's journey, my journey, and the human journey. I came away reassured and inspired that living a full life in the world does not have to be separated from a spiritual life." — John Davis, author of The Diamond Approach: An Introduction to the Teachings of A.H. Almaas
Unfolding the Heart delivers a life examined with honesty--the slaps and the silences. Annoni's prose knows how to hold still. That's harder than it sounds." — Los Angeles Book Review
"An ordained spiritual teacher reflects on her journey in this debut memoir . . . a gentle, searching remembrance of a woman's quest for spiritual meaning." —Kirkus Reviews
"Annoni's writing is open, inviting, and often emotionally intense . . . Her memoir will resonate with readers who are on their own healing journey." —Publishers Weekly
"It delivers a life examined with honesty. . . . Annoni's prose knows how to hold still. That's harder than it sounds." —City Book Review
Where is it happening?
Event Location & Nearby Stays:
USD 0.00 to USD 21.00
