Dear friends,
I hope you're all safe and well and coping ok with the latest lockdown. We're all in need of stuff to read, so I thought it might be nice to start publishing some extracts from the book. We've put an excerpt from chapter 1 on the website (click on PROJECT SYNOPSIS and scroll down, it's just underneath the cover image), I hope you enjoy it.
"Enjoy" might seem an inappropriate word for a memoir about grief. The book is, of course, sad, but I hope it will be illuminating and helpful too. It's about finding routes - if only temporaily - out of loss and heartbreak. And of course what it is really about is love. Love, and families and friends, and the connections between us, whether our loved ones are alive or dead.
Like most of us, I have been managing to (just about) stay sane by getting out and walking and swimming as much as possible. I had the most ethereal walk a few days ago when we were still in the grip of wintery wonderness, everything white and hard and cold. We set off along an ancient track called the Abbots Way, which was the route the monks used to take between the abbeys on Dartmoor. It was very still and quite foggy, and occasionally we heard the voices of other walkers drifting over in the mist.
Each and every stalk and leaf and grass - even the lichen - was etched with hoar frost and the ground was hard beneath our feet. I kept thinking of those magical words by Christina Rossetti: Earth stood hard as iron. Water like a stone.
Thank you again for your support. At the time of writing, the book is 48% funding so there is still some way to go, but I am keeping my hopes up!
Warmest wishes
Sophie