A daughter’s brave journey to honor her mother

“Braver Than You Think: Around the World on the Trip of My (Mother’s) Lifetime” is the debut memoir by Palm Springs-based writer Maggie Downs. Part travelogue, part meditation on grief and love, Downs chronicles her journey around the globe to experience all the places her mother, struck with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, could not visit herself. This excerpt from Downs’ memoir takes place in Kigali, Rwanda, at the end of a long night at a local dance club called