Meet The Author

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Raised in a small town in west-central Minnesota, Pearl Haining fell in love with traditional American values and simple living at an early age. She appreciates the value of things commonly referred to as "old fashioned", such as loyalty, respect, kindness, and grammatically correct sentence structure.

After a childhood illness left Pearl partially disabled, she began playing harmonica as a form of therapy. Harmonica eventually became her profession as she, and her three, multi-instrumentalist siblings, formed a band and began performing with their parents throughout Minnesota. The Haining Family has since traveled coast-to-coast performing throughout the United States. In 2011, Pearl and her family relocated to Branson, Missouri.

Learning to live with physical handicaps has taught Pearl the importance of not taking life for granted, and finding joy in simple pleasures. Her hobbies include: reading, writing, drinking coffee, fishing, drinking coffee, making and/or enjoying great music, and drinking coffee.  

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A s an entertainer, my job is to give people a reason to smile. Many of the songs I sing are to help my audience either forget their struggles or find new courage to face them, and any emotion I feel or convey from the stage is dictated by that principle. If only emotions were that predictable off stage. I grew up hearing cliches like "life is what you make it" and "happiness is a choice", and I guess I just assumed that was true. I still think it is - to a degree - but not every emotion can be called a choice. I know better than that now, and so does anyone else who's struggled with depression. I know what you're thinking: "What do you know about depression, Pearl? You're one of the funniest people I know. Do you even know how to not smile?" Well shucks, thanks for complimenting my sense of humor! But yes, I have actually experienced very smile-less depression, and more than once. I never woke up one day and said "I think I'll...
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I can remember it like it was yesterday but yet it's somewhat of a blur. It started on October 11th, 2015. We were relaxing in an Oklahoma hotel room on a Sunday afternoon, and some of us were going to take a short nap before going to set up for our show that evening, but the phone rang before any of us could fall asleep. The call was from a friend in Minnesota who had gone to visit my grandparents that day. Grandma had been quite ill for a while, but we thought she was on the mend. Our friend, who had a background as a hospice nurse, could see otherwise. "How soon can you get here?", she asked my mom. "I know performing is your livelihood, and I feel sick telling you to cancel a show, but I'd feel worse if I didn't. The time it takes to do the concert might be all the time you'd have to say goodbye." So, we canceled our show and left the hotel as fast as we could pack. We got in the van and headed north. We stopped after a few hour...
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