‘A powerfully confessional memoir that excavates important truths about our lives, our selves and our dreams - and what happens when we have to let go.’
– Clover Stroud, author of My Wild and Sleepless Nights
‘The 'how I moved to a field and had a breakdown book' that desperately needed to be written. Incredibly bold, brave, poetic and absolutely beautiful: a fascinating insight into the mind.’
– Sophie Heawood, author of The Hungover Games
‘So honest, so raw and so vulnerable. This much-needed story of resilience integrates history, myth and folklore, drawing on the histories of the people who have gone before and to whom this land once belonged. Such an evocative, sensitive and a refreshing take on nature writing and memoir.’
– Dr Pragya Agarwal, author of Sway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias
‘A lyrical journey through nature and the human heart.'
– Sarah Langford, author of In Your Defence
Earthed
By Rebecca Schiller
Elliott & Thompson / 6 May 2021 / Hardback / £14.99
A courageous memoir for our uncertain times: Earthed is a story of the power of place to transform us, of dreams and nightmares on the land and of living in an unfamiliar world and a volatile mind.
In 2017, Rebecca Schiller turned fantasy to reality and moved her family to a countryside smallholding for a life of sowing and growing. But as the first few years go by, and the ever-expanding list of tasks builds to a cacophony, it becomes clear that this is not going to be simple.
Another January comes in, and with it the threat of a mental health crisis, and so Rebecca turns to the garden where she has made her home, and to the women of this place’s past. Here, she stumbles on a wild space of imaginative leaps, where she begins to uncover the hidden layers of her plot’s history – and of herself.
The ground under Rebecca’s boots offers hard lessons as the seasons shift, delivering unflinching glimpses of damage done to peoples and the planet and regular defeats in her battle with the slugs.
Yet as the New Year returns, carrying a life-changing diagnosis and then a global pandemic, Rebecca begins to move forwards with hope: the smallholding has become her anchor, her teacher and her family’s shelter. Because when we find ourselves in an unknown land, we all need something small to hold on to and a way to keep ourselves earthed.
TALKING POINTS & FEATURE IDEAS
Mental health and the cost of hidden neurodiversity:
in a time of pandemic as well as personal, political and environmental crisis
exposing the destructive burden of undiagnosed ADHD
the feminist issues raised by widespread underdiagnosis in women and girls and the
the highs and lows of smallholding as therapy: working the land, tending livestock and growing food to rebuild after breakdown and overwhelm
The real story of the not-so-simple life:
exploring our impulse to go back to nature, self-sufficiency, sowing and growing in uncertain times
the practical lessons and joys of smallholding life: from breeding goats and 'counting chickens', to growing food as a family
an unflinching look at the back-breaking, marriage-straining reality of following our post-pandemic escape-to-the-countryside dreams
Uncovering our land's hidden histories and politics:
stories of the neglected women of our land's past and how their voices can help us today
tracing an English country garden back to our brutal, colonial roots
looking towards an uncertain future where climate change, political division, race inequality and pandemics collide
asking how to live, love and thrive in complicated times of hope, fear and change
ABOUT Rebecca Schiller
Rebecca Schiller is a writer, journalist and the author of Your No Guilt Pregnancy Plan (Penguin Life) and Why Human Rights in Childbirth Matter. She is co-founder and trustee of the human rights charity Birthrights and a regular contributor to the Guardian. Rebecca and her family raise a motley crew of goats, geese, ducks and chickens. They work their small plot to grow vegetables, fruit and flowers and restore wildlife to the land.
The linocut on the jacket of Earthed was designed and painted by Anne Fewster using natural inks and pigments made from the author's smallholding, land and garden.