Overview

From the acclaimed author of Thin Places, a luminous day book about an unexpected year and finding home. Two days after the winter solstice in 2019, Kerri and her partner moved to a remote cottage in the heart of Ireland. They were looking for a home, somewhere to settle into a stable life. Then the pandemic arrived and their secluded abode became a place of enforced isolation. What was meant to be the beginning of an enriching new chapter was instead marked by uncertainty and fear. The seasons still passed, the swallows returned, the rhythms of the natural world went on, but in many ways 2020 was unlike any year we had seen before. And for Kerri there would be one more change: a baby, longed for but utterly, beautifully unexpected.Intensely lyrical, fragmentary in subject and form, Cacophony of Bone is an ode to a year, a place, and a love that transformed a life. When the pandemic came, time seemed to shapeshift; in Kerri's elegant prose, we can trace its quickening, its slowing. She maps the circle of a year--a journey from one place to another, field notes of a life--from one winter to the next, telling of a changed life in a changed world, as well as all that stays the same. All that keeps on living and breathing, nesting and dying. This is a book for the reader who wants to slow down, guided by a voice that is utterly singular, ""rich and strange,"" (Robert Macfarlane). A book about home--the deepening of family, the connections that sustain us.

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9781571311573

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Reviews

Kerri's voice is utterly her own, rich and strange. I've folded down the corners of many pages, marking sentences and moments that glitter out at me. Wow. --Robert Macfarlane, author of Underland Powerful, unflinching . . . Part hymn to nature, part memoir. Guardian Dochartaigh takes great solace in nature, and much of the book is a meditation on the beautiful landscapes and flora and fauna that surround her . . . Passionate, moving and beautifully written. Sunday Times Kerri ni Dochartaigh is something of a modern-day mystic, a writer of acute sensitivity and wonder. There is such beauty, such pain, such rawness in this diary of an extraordinary year--you read it feeling quickened, awakened - that you, too, are missing a layer of skin. It's a very special book indeed. --Lucy Caldwell, author of These Days [Kerri] is sensitive to the legacies of loss and trauma and highly attuned to the gifts of the natural world and the possibilities of place. --Amy Liptrot, author of The Instant Piercingly honest, movingly heartfelt. There is so much soul and knowledge and compassion, it gave me shivers. --Elif Shafak, author of The Island of Missing Trees Full of wisdom and deeply engaging. --Sinead Gleeson, author of Constellations Kerri ni Dochartaigh's written form is unique and a wonder--like finding a 'hag-stone' on a beach of otherwise everyday solid pebbles--her words are strong and resilient, yet allow light to flow through their very core--igniting hope, grief and allowing us to find connection with the other than human world. --Jo Sweeting, @thestonecarver

Kerri's voice is utterly her own, rich and strange. I've folded down the corners of many pages, marking sentences and moments that glitter out at me. Wow. --Robert Macfarlane, author of Underland Powerful, unflinching . . . Part hymn to nature, part memoir. Guardian Dochartaigh takes great solace in nature, and much of the book is a meditation on the beautiful landscapes and flora and fauna that surround her . . . Passionate, moving and beautifully written. Sunday Times Kerri ni Dochartaigh is something of a modern-day mystic, a writer of acute sensitivity and wonder. There is such beauty, such pain, such rawness in this diary of an extraordinary year--you read it feeling quickened, awakened - that you, too, are missing a layer of skin. It's a very special book indeed. --Lucy Caldwell, author of These Days [Kerri] is sensitive to the legacies of loss and trauma and highly attuned to the gifts of the natural world and the possibilities of place. --Amy Liptrot, author of The Instant Piercingly honest, movingly heartfelt. There is so much soul and knowledge and compassion, it gave me shivers. --Elif Shafak, author of The Island of Missing Trees Full of wisdom and deeply engaging. --Sinead Gleeson, author of Constellations Kerri ni Dochartaigh's written form is unique and a wonder--like finding a 'hag-stone' on a beach of otherwise everyday solid pebbles--her words are strong and resilient, yet allow light to flow through their very core--igniting hope, grief and allowing us to find connection with the other than human world. --Jo Sweeting, @thestonecarver

Praise for Cacophony of Bone Kerri's voice is utterly her own, rich and strange. I've folded down the corners of many pages, marking sentences and moments that glitter out at me. Wow. --Robert Macfarlane, author of Underland Powerful, unflinching . . . Part hymn to nature, part memoir. Guardian Dochartaigh takes great solace in nature, and much of the book is a meditation on the beautiful landscapes and flora and fauna that surround her . . . Passionate, moving and beautifully written. Sunday Times Kerri ni Dochartaigh is something of a modern-day mystic, a writer of acute sensitivity and wonder. There is such beauty, such pain, such rawness in this diary of an extraordinary year--you read it feeling quickened, awakened - that you, too, are missing a layer of skin. It's a very special book indeed. --Lucy Caldwell, author of These Days [Kerri] is sensitive to the legacies of loss and trauma and highly attuned to the gifts of the natural world and the possibilities of place. --Amy Liptrot, author of The Instant Piercingly honest, movingly heartfelt. There is so much soul and knowledge and compassion, it gave me shivers. --Elif Shafak, author of The Island of Missing Trees Full of wisdom and deeply engaging. --Sinead Gleeson, author of Constellations Praise for Thin Places Luminous . . . For the author, who has suffered from alcoholism, depression, and suicidal ideation, the wild places surrounding her hometown help release her anxieties and bring her unparalleled peace. They have become her thin places. A beautifully written tribute to the healing power of nature. --Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review In writing that's ethereal and elliptical, [Dochartaigh] laments Ireland's collective 'loss of connection with the natural world' and cleverly uses this 'unwilding' as a warning about the threat of extinction faced by indigenous flora and fauna, and also as a lens through which to look at the toll of oppression and violence on humanity . . . By turns subtle and urgent, this offers a powerful and complex portrait of a land and its people. --Publishers Weekly A remarkable piece of writing. I don't think I've ever read a book as open-hearted as this. It resists easy pieties of nature as a healing force, but nevertheless charts a recovery which could never have been achieved without landscape, wild creatures and 'thin places.' It is also flocked with luminous details (moths, birds, feathers, skulls, moving water). Kerri's voice is utterly her own, rich and strange. I've folded down the corners of many pages, marking sentences and moments that glitter out at me. Wow. --Robert Macfarlane, author of Underland How does a person contend with coming from a place where suffering is part of its legacy? . . . It takes ni Dochartaigh many years to find her way back to the most important place of all: herself. Whether she's meditating on moths or birds or the vivid colors of her home country, it's her own perspective on the world around her that grounds her, soothes her, and offers solace. --Michele Filgate, Boston Globe

"Praise for Cacophony of Bone""Kerri's voice is utterly her own, rich and strange. I've folded down the corners of many pages, marking sentences and moments that glitter out at me. Wow.""--Robert Macfarlane, author of Underland""Powerful, unflinching . . . Part hymn to nature, part memoir.""―Guardian ""Dochartaigh takes great solace in nature, and much of the book is a meditation on the beautiful landscapes and flora and fauna that surround her . . . Passionate, moving and beautifully written.""―Sunday Times""Kerri ní Dochartaigh is something of a modern-day mystic, a writer of acute sensitivity and wonder. There is such beauty, such pain, such rawness in this diary of an extraordinary year--you read it feeling quickened, awakened - that you, too, are missing a layer of skin. It's a very special book indeed.""--Lucy Caldwell, author of These Days""[Kerri] is sensitive to the legacies of loss and trauma and highly attuned to the gifts of the natural world and the possibilities of place.""--Amy Liptrot, author of The Instant ""Piercingly honest, movingly heartfelt. There is so much soul and knowledge and compassion, it gave me shivers.""--Elif Shafak, author of The Island of Missing Trees ""Full of wisdom and deeply engaging.""--Sinead Gleeson, author of Constellations Praise for Thin Places ""Luminous . . . For the author, who has suffered from alcoholism, depression, and suicidal ideation, the wild places surrounding her hometown help release her anxieties and bring her unparalleled peace. They have become her thin places. A beautifully written tribute to the healing power of nature.""--Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review""In writing that's ethereal and elliptical, [Dochartaigh] laments Ireland's collective 'loss of connection with the natural world' and cleverly uses this 'unwilding' as a warning about the threat of extinction faced by indigenous flora and fauna, and also as a lens through which to look at the toll of oppression and violence on humanity . . . By turns subtle and urgent, this offers a powerful and complex portrait of a land and its people."" --Publishers Weekly""A remarkable piece of writing. I don't think I've ever read a book as open-hearted as this. It resists easy pieties of nature as a healing force, but nevertheless charts a recovery which could never have been achieved without landscape, wild creatures and 'thin places.' It is also flocked with luminous details (moths, birds, feathers, skulls, moving water). Kerri's voice is utterly her own, rich and strange. I've folded down the corners of many pages, marking sentences and moments that glitter out at me. Wow.""--Robert Macfarlane, author of Underland ""How does a person contend with coming from a place where suffering is part of its legacy? . . . It takes ní Dochartaigh many years to find her way back to the most important place of all: herself. Whether she's meditating on moths or birds or the vivid colors of her home country, it's her own perspective on the world around her that grounds her, soothes her, and offers solace.""--Michele Filgate, Boston Globe"

Author Information

Kerri ní Dochartaigh is the author of Thin Places. She has written for The Guardian, the Irish Times, the BBC, Winter Papers, and others. She is from the North West of Ireland but now lives in the middle, in an old railway cottage with her partner and dog.

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