Reviews call it brutally honest and lyrical. Unputdownable, with an extraordinary literary voice that resists tidy resolution while still delivering real arc and growth. One review compared it favourably to Eat, Pray, Love, but with, one might argue, considerably more grit and considerably better prose.

I’ll take that ;)

For potential readers, here's a little about the book. It is a memoir about navigating a fractured past while learning the ancient craft of drystone walling in the Scottish Highlands. Readers are a witness to both my undoing and the rebuilding that follows.

My book 'Drystone - A Life Rebuilt' will be out in the US and Canada now. That's very exciting, but the downside is that the energy it takes to promote a book overseas is sadly not available to me right now, maybe ever.

So, if you've been waiting to buy it, you can. If you've been waiting to order it into your library, you can. If you've been waiting to tell your friends who are reviewers at the NYT, you can ;)

#Books #Writing #WritingCommunity #Reading #ReadingCommunity #USA #Canada

An inquest in Queensland this week heard that Kelly Wilkinson was told by police to 'cool off, give Brian a break' four days before her husband Brian killed her. Kelly Wilkinson is at the worst end of a spectrum. The logical conclusion of a thousand smaller failures.

I read it & felt like it was time to share my own experience. 4 years of stalking, harassment, & police failure.

https://kristiedegaris.substack.com/p/no-further-action

#Scotland #UK #Law #Women #Police #Writing #WritingCommunity #Books #Book #News #Australia

This piece is about drystone walling, and about belonging. About building something solid before building something beautiful. About making a life, and a place in it, with your own hands.

https://kristiedegaris.substack.com/p/the-work-of-belonging

#Scotland #UK #Books #Book #Reading #Writing #WritingCommunity #Women #Land #Nature #Life

THREAD

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My daughter took this photograph of me today, quickly, in my bedroom. We swept the mess off the table, moved the dirty clothes off the chair and tried to make things look presentable, including me.

I complained the entire time about how I looked. The light wasn’t good, my hair was greasy, I’m 42 on Sunday, I want to lose weight, I’m in perimenopause. But this is something I do. Saying it out loud has become a habit.

#Books #Writing #WritingCommunity #Reading #Scotland #UK

I call myself a fair-weather waller. I don’t do drystone work through the worst of winter. If you have ever jammed numb fingers between cold stones, started a morning by sledgehammering apart a frozen stone pile, or done a pee outside, bum exposed to biting winter air, you will understand why.

Drystone season is almost upon us. This year we have a run of really interesting jobs and I have a new ambition, learning to drive a digger.

#Scotland #UK #Sustainability #Nature #Art

I don’t write about being chronically ill very often, mostly because I’m still thinking it through in real time.

This short piece is about effort, belief, and what it’s like to live in a culture that insists improvement is always possible…even when your body says otherwise.

https://kristiedegaris.substack.com/p/effort-without-improvement

#Health #Scotland #UK #Writing #WritingCommunity #Books #Reading #Women

Since the Second World War, we've said 'never again' like we were casting a spell of guarantee. But 'never again' was a commitment, and we did not keep it.

We have witnessed the rise of fascism in the United States, and the most disturbing part is that almost nothing stood in its way.

A piece about earnestness, and what happens when you stop saving up goodwill and consider running up some irreverence debt.

'Online, though, and especially in my writing, I’ve noticed how earnest I’ve become. Soulfully earnest. Solely earnest. I mean everything I say, I believe everything I’m saying, but I don’t entirely recognise the person saying it.'

https://kristiedegaris.substack.com/p/on-accidentally-becoming-earnest

#Scotland #UK #Writing #WritingCommunity #Reading #Books #Women

I’ve just published a new piece of writing.

It’s a serious literary work that sits between essay and narrative, and it’s concerned with women’s anger and imagination in the aftermath of violence. This is the kind of writing I want to be doing, so your support means a lot.

The piece moves between memory and fantasy to examine what happens when justice and repair are absent, and imagination becomes one of the only remaining sites of agency.

https://kristiedegaris.substack.com/p/kristie-the-bastard

Mozart’s Symphony No. 31 in D Major goes incredibly hard.

It’s joyful, but joy standing up straight with its shoulders back. Confrontational, but with bright eyes, a skip in its step, and a big smile on its face.

I suddenly feel prepared to defend every position I’ve ever held. Die on that hill? Someone will.

@Infoseepage I'm on my way.

A £9 baguette in Dunkeld (wtf). A walk as the weather set in. The snow makes everything so peaceful. Thank God for thermals.

#Scotland #Snow #UK #Photography #LandscapePhotography #Landscape #Weather

I’ve just finished The Serpent and the Rainbow by Wade Davis, & there’s an excerpt I can’t stop thinking about.

It’s about how ways of knowing are never neutral, never free. How every system sharpens certain understanding at the expense of others. And how, in pursuing clarity, we sometimes lose things and forget they were ever there.

A short piece from me, and the excerpt itself. Take your time with it. Let it work on you.

https://kristiedegaris.substack.com/p/i-can-no-longer-see-venus

#Writing #Reading #Scotland #UK #Books

Hello friends in Scotland 👋

I have a lot of children’s books and clothes (used but in excellent condition) that I was planning to donate to a charity shop. Before I do, I wondered if there’s anywhere locally (I'm in Perthshire) that would pass items directly to families who might need them for free - community groups, mutual aid networks, schools, or similar?

I’d much rather they went straight to someone who could use them.

Any suggestions welcome, thank you!

#Scotland #Perthshire

As I have been fully focused on the book, I’ve let photography fade a little into the background, but it was my first great love and I can’t wait to get back to it.

Here’s is a 35mm film image that captures some of the magic in the Tomnah’a polytunnels.

#Photography #FilmPhotography #35mm #Scotland #FilmIsNotDead #BelieveInFilm #Flowers

A PSA

Getting sick doesn’t do what you think it does.

Viruses can only create new variants when they spread. More infections = more replication = more mutations = more chances for a fitter, more evasive strain to appear.

Very few viruses give lifelong immunity. Most immunity to respiratory viruses fades, and with high levels of transmission, new variants appear often. That’s why we keep getting sick.

Getting sick doesn’t fix the problem. It drives it.

https://xkcd.com/2557/

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I learn from people who know more than I do.

I read a lot. I ask questions. I change my mind. I don’t treat parenting like something I’m meant to instinctively understand. Good information makes me a better parent.

4/

I read about neurodevelopment really early on.

Not to optimise my children or turn their childhood into a project, but to understand what’s realistic for a nervous system at different ages. Most conflict in family life comes from expecting a child to do something their brain simply cannot do yet. Once I saw the developmental picture, so much dropped into place: the struggles, the gaps, the limits.