A literary debut by journalist Amy Liptrot (b. 1984), which won the 2016 Wainwright Prize for Nature Book and the 2017 PEN Ackerley Prize for Autobiography, is a story of escape from bustling London to the floodplains of the Orkney Islands.
Told in the form of a frank diary, it documents the narrator's self-discovery through the struggle with false attachments (cigarettes, Coca-Cola, relationships, the Internet) that replaced urban experiences with alcohol and drugs.
Once a young woman, Amy left a remote island in the archipelago in north-east Scotland to conquer the capital of the kingdom, joining the legion of freelance workers in the creative industries. Now she's making a journey back, discovering the wild power of the Atlantic Ocean and reconciling the past with the present.
What began as forced self-isolation turned into the birth of a new life. The book became a landmark in contemporary British prose, sparking a fashion for a half-forgotten corner of the Scottish coast.