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Dark, Salt, Clear: The Life of a Fishing Town
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About This Book
There is the Cornwall Lamorna Ash knew as a child - the idyllic, folklore-rich place where she spent her summer holidays. Then there is the Cornwall she discovers when, feeling increasingly dislocated in London, she moves to Newlyn, a fishing town near Land's End. This Cornwall is messier and harder; it doesn't seem like a place that would welcome strangers. But before long, Lamorna finds herself on a week-long trawler trip with a crew of local fishermen, afforded a rare glimpse into their world, their warmth and their humour. Out on the water, miles from the coast, she learns how fishing requires you to confront who you are and what it is that tethers you to the land. Dark, Salt, Clear is a bracing journey of discovery and a captivating portrait of a community sustained and defined by the sea for centuries.
Reviews
"The only flaw, though slight, is in the structure of the book."
"Part coming-of-age memoir, part anthropological study, Dark, Salt, Clear glistens with deftly told snippets and character-rich stories: about the habits of fish and the art of catching them; about the bifurcating life of sea and shore; about 'salt-licked winds' and squawking seabirds; and, perhaps most poignantly, about Lamorna Ash herself, the 'emmet' or outsider, who so desperately desires to belong ..."
"Playwright Ash turns a curious and empathetic eye on the small fishing village of Newlyn in Cornwall, England, weaving history, myth, and memoir into a gripping and affecting debut ..."
"On top of everything else, this book charts the author's own passage to maturity as she re-evaluates what matters to her ..."
"However, more irritating references are also abundant."
"Sebald, Elizabeth Bishop, Walter Benjamin, Virginia Woolf, Simone Weil, and Barry Lopez, as she considers the indelible connection of identity to geography ..."
"Dark, Salt, Clear , melds history, literature and the highly personal into something far more complex and compelling than the 'evocative journey replete with poetry' of the publisher's blurb."
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