“I enter the tomb on something like a wide skateboard, using the rope strung from the roof of the narrow, three metre-long passageway….”
First instalment of my exploration of a place that has haunted me for 18 years—the Tomb of the Eagles. Become a paid subscriber to my blog–now hosted on Ghost.io— to read this and other exclusive posts as well as join our online Outlier Hour of writing and conversation—THIS SATURDAY! https://allysonshaw.ghost.io/inside-the-hollow-hill/
As a sick young woman I poured over Vogue Italia—imagining not wealth nor thinness but the ability and desire to get dressed, to adorn.
Bed rest, runway shows and being hame-drauchtit, or homesick: This month’s essay is free to read at my Substack.
In this two hour master class we will centre on facets of place writing informed by anti-colonial re-enchantment of land, place, and home.
28th of April, 2024. 7pm GMT £25, tickets via Eventbrite
I’ll share practical tips for forming or renewing a sense of place in your writing. Together we’ll examine our places, sharing discoveries and challenges as a group, exploring forces shaping our place-writing from gentrification to the Scottish Diaspora, and more. There will be prompts and inspiration for future work.
I bring decades of experience teaching writing to my online workshops. I’ve taught at the University of California and Colleges in the US, delivered community writing workshops as well as master classes for the Taibhsear Collective.
Paid subscribers to my Substack receive a 20%discount cod
Find out about past and upcoming workshops at my Workshops page.
The North American Edition of Ashes and Stones arrived today—published by Pegasus Books in the US on October 3rd. The stone on the cover is the Nicnevin stone in the village of Monzie. Named after the legendary woman burnt as a witch named Kate Nicnevin who also shares a name with Nicnevin, the mythic Scottish witch-goddess and the leader of the wild hunt in lore. According to Sir Walter Scott, she is the “Scottish Hecate.” The most notable fragments of her come to us from 17th century ‘flyting’ poems—word fights where she is mentioned satirically. Yet, in Monzie, magical women, holy wells, cliffs and neolithic menhirs are named after her. I write about this stone and mythic Nicnevin at length in a chapter in Ashes and Stones. It’s so exciting to see the wee stone on the spine of the book!
[IMAGE DESCRIPTION]: Hand holding a hardback book entitled Ashes and Stones. The book has a standing stone in a moor on it and the grey sky is full of ravens. The hand holds the book over a moor of blooming heather and the horizon on the book lines up with the horizon on the photo.]
Pre-oder the North American edition here.
Today, the day after the Blue Super Moon, Waterstones announced that Ashes and Stones is the Scottish Book of the Month for September, 2023. Is this not magic? I’m over the (blue, super) moon about this news. Grateful to have the support of Waterstones which will display the book prominently in all Scottish locations, and there will be promotions as well. It will help get the book to a whole new readership!
I’m delighted that Pegasus Books will publish Ashes and Stones in North America. The hardback will be available on 3 October, 2023. Preorders are open now.
a moving reminder for us all to connect with what’s gone before
–The Stylist
I’m so pleased to share the gorgeous cover design for Ashes and Stones by Natalie Chen. The illustrator is Iain MacArthur.
‘It’s summer. I stand where perhaps Ellen stood, in this ground thick with new thistle and long grass. She would have ken this coast in all weathers: in the summer when it was as gentle as a lake and in the winter, with the high winds and stinging salt spray.’
Ashes and Stones is a moving and personal journey, along rugged coasts and through remote villages and modern cities, in search of the traces of those accused of witchcraft in seventeenth-century Scotland. We visit modern memorials, roadside shrines and standing stones, and roam among forests and hedge mazes, folk lore and political fantasies. From fairy hills to forgotten caves, we explore a spellbound landscape.
Out 19 January, 2023. Preorder Now:
Blackwells (offers free shipping to the USA)
Join my Patreon as a Valiant Witness and receive a signed copy of Ashes & Stones. I ship worldwide.
My piece on the Maggie Wall monument, “The Cairn” will appear in issue 2 of Rituals and Declarations, now available for preorder here. (cover by Maria Strutz)
Allyson Shaw, Author of Ashes and Stones 