Drystone: A Life Rebuilt

(Hardback)

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Description

Kristie De Garis spent years running from places, people and parts of herself. But chaos always followed.

When she moved to rural Scotland, she hoped to find peace. Instead, in the space and silence, she was forced to confront everything she had tried to escape: racism, trauma, undiagnosed ADHD, addiction and the stark realities of motherhood.

Then, in the land around her and in the slow, stubborn craft of drystone walling she began to see a different life. One that was quiet, deliberate, and her own.

Drystone: A Life Rebuiltis unflinchingly honest and unexpectedly funny. A story about the weight of the past, resilience and the hard work of living on your own terms.

Some things may never change. What matters is the life you build anyway.

Reviews

'An incredibly powerful debut, Drystone is an account of survival, strength, and quiet transformation that stays with you long after the final page. Written with clarity and compassion, it reflects not only lifes hardest moments, but its tender, deeply human ones too. A life-affirming work'

-- Rebecca Smith, author of Rural: The Lives of the Working Class

'Drystone is as beautifully rendered as the walls De Garis creates'

-- Julie Vuong * The Bookseller *

'Drystone doesnt pull any punches, its shockingly frank but also has the most beautiful literary touch. The child picking up a satisfyingly smooth pebble, the adult surviving what is thrown at her.

-- Tracy King, author of memoir Learning to Think

'Honest, funny, direct and moving, this is a memoir of resilience and finding the life that suits you'

* Books from Scotland *

'Absorbing, enraging, funny and moving, like a Scottish mixed-race Monica Heisey with bonus dry stone walling, De Garis unpacks the effects of racism, intergenerational trauma, and undiagnosed neurodivergence on her relationships and life, deftly interweaving the work of walling with the slow, deliberated work of rebuilding something beautiful, functional and sustainable'

-- Polly Atkin, author of Some of Us Just Fall

Author Bio

Kristie De Garis is a writer, photographer and drystone waller based in Perthshire, Scotland, where she lives a quiet and carefully curated life. Drystone: A Life Rebuilt is her first book.