no, you’re not hearing things
free to read | what women’s lives actually sound like
What are you listening to right now? I can hear the distant squeal of the train pulling into the station, the whistle of a plane overheard, the high-pitched thrum of water in the pipes. My tinnitus is going but it’s not so bad. A bird chirruping. More deeply: my house is purposefully quiet. My husband has taken the children out so I can write; more, so I can have some time to be by myself after three long days (and broken nights) of parenting. This space is a novel one. My thoughts start to talk to me again, my creative thoughts, rather than my errand-based ones. I can think beyond the immediate. This has sound too.
Today marks the paperback release of my latest book, Hark: How Women Listen. It’s a book that aims to validate how we live our lives by acknowledging how they sound, from whether the aurora borealis makes noise and listening to nightingales, to the pitch of a baby crying in the night and how we can listen when we can no longer hear.
Hark has been described as a ‘quiet yet profound kind of miracle’ by Clover Stroud and ‘stimulating and humane’ by Amy Liptrot. It’s a book that I wrote to help me get through the toughest part of my life and it’s a book that I get messages from readers saying it’s helped them understand what they went through, too. ‘I’ve not read anything yet that so beautifully articulated my first months of being a parent,’ wrote a stranger on NetGalley. ‘It speaks to those who feel unheard, providing both a gentle invitation and a challenge to listen more intently in a world that too often fails to listen back,’ wrote another.
I’m putting all this here because I’m not great at listening to praise, all told, and, well, I’d like to convince you the book is worth your time. My dear friend and non-bullshitter Charlotte Runcie said it was my best one yet, as did my husband (brutally honest with my work, he is my most-trusted reader), and the thing is I think it’s my best book, too. It’s also my weirdest. I feel very protective over it.
Anyway. If you’re interested, and you’d like to read or listen to some of it, here’s a few pieces I wrote to support the book, which should give you an idea.
podcasts
extracts and newsletters
come and have a chat about it
a little book tour
Last year’s was quite something: a multi-city month in May, another in the autumn, finishing days before the baby came. This time, I vowed to do something a bit smaller. These are the dates:
If you’ve read Hark, or you think you know someone who might enjoy it, I would love to hear from you in the comments below. I really appreciate the savour members and newsletter readers who have turned out and supported the book. It really means the world; I love that you’re listening - thank you.