{"title":"Ailsa Piper","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"attachment-book-ailsa-piper-9781760294687","title":"The Attachment","description":"Dear Ailsa, Sometimes I wonder whether the friendship that has caught us both - a most unlikely friendship I must confess - might find an echo in a far off Irish village somewhere in the wild, windy hills of old Donegal. Or am I allowing that uncontrollable imagination of mine too much slack?  This is the story of an unlikely friendship.  When priest and Sydneysider Tony Doherty emailed Melbourne-based writer and performer Ailsa Piper to say how much he had enjoyed her latest book, he was met with a swift reply from a similarly enquiring mind. Soon emails were flying back and forth and back again. They exchanged stories of their experiences as sweaty pilgrims and dissected dinner party menus. They shared their delight in Mary Oliver's poetry and wrestled with what it means to love and to grieve. This energetic exchange of words, questions and ideas grew into an unexpected but treasured friendship.  Collected here is that correspondence, brimming with empathy, humour and a fierce curiosity about each other and the worlds, shoes and histories that they inhabit. Described by one reader as 'a demonstration of how to have a conversation and a friendship', The Attachment is an intriguing, entertaining and moving celebration of family, faith, connection - even the correct time of day to enjoy rhubarb.  Dear Tony, Funny how our ears tune in to things. How our priorities shift based on who and what we know. How we come to care about such abstract or remote things through the experience of another. Lovely, somehow, but so serendipitous. All the other things we might care about. All that we might have missed had we not stopped to care for this person. I'm glad we stopped for each other.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49597188407569,"sku":"GOR010809213","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1760294683.jpg?v=1759230781"},{"product_id":"sinning-across-spain-book-ailsa-piper-9780522872224","title":"Sinning Across Spain","description":"Walking has been the constant in Ailsa Piper's life. Setting down one foot after the other takes her to a transformative and transcendent place. Faced with the untimely death of her husband, Peter, her true north, Ailsa returns to the Camino trail, this time in France, to walk through her sorrow. This updated edition includes the story of a walk where the burden is grief, not the sins of others.  Sinning Across Spain was inspired by the tradition of medieval walkers who were paid by others to carry their sins to holy places. Ailsa's cargo included anger, envy, pride and lust. She hiked alone through the endless olive groves of the Camino Mozarabe, from the legendary southern city of Granada toward the centuries-old pilgrim destination, Santiago de Compostela, in the far north-west of Spain. In dusty pueblos and epic landscapes, miracles found her. Angels in both name and nature eased her path.  Ailsa's second pilgrimage is born of grief and death but ultimately sees her walking into life and hope.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49654669345041,"sku":"GOR012190302","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51003275411729,"sku":"NIN9780522872224","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0522872220.jpg?v=1751261736"},{"product_id":"for-life-book-ailsa-piper-9781761470868","title":"For Life","description":"After I swim, I watch an osprey hanging in mid-air. If those who came before really do dissolve and dissipate, and if their cells really are all around us, then that bird is held there by Mum and Peter and billions of others of the long-dead. The osprey is kept aloft by absences. Perhaps I am too.  When her husband doesn't answer his phone, Ailsa Piper knows something is wrong. She calls their neighbour, and minutes later, he rings back. 'Oh, Ailsa. I'm so sorry,' he says. Five words to change a life.  Wanting to flee her shattered world in Melbourne, Ailsa migrates north to Sydney. She makes a nest. She learns to swim. She walks the harbour cliffs to the lighthouse, meeting the locals: winter swimmers and shoreline philosophers.  But we never leave our past behind. Ailsa is drawn back south, and even further back, to the west's aqua waters ...  'As strong and as light as a bird, For Life is a loving, courageous account of the black mess of grief and the slow return to a flourishing life. Perhaps it's only by staring death in the face that one can wholeheartedly celebrate the profound, joyful luck of being alive, and this book does both. Unflinching and tender, it shows us how to grieve. And it enacts the deep, human need to properly lay the dead to rest. You will cry reading this book, but you will also look up and see the world afresh, newly aware of the pulsing beat of your heart, grateful for the sun in your eyes.' Charlotte Wood, author of Stone Yard Devotional  'A beautiful, courageous and unflinching testament to life. To love shadowed by loss. To the howl of impermanence salved by beauty and the interconnectedness of all things. A book of hope and humanity.' Sarah Winman, author of Still Life  'This beautiful book made my heart sing and break at the same time.'Michael Robotham, author of Storm Child   'A wondrous, delicately constructed memoir. I loved it.' Bill Hayes, author of Insomniac City: New York, Oliver Sacks, and Me   'Finely wrought, and exquisitely told, Ailsa Piper's memoir describes the art of moving forward, even in the face of unbearable loss. For Life is, in the end, a celebration - of love, of nature, of language itself. I loved it for about a million reasons, often reading through a veil of tears.' Sofie Laguna, author of Infinite Splendours   'Piper's writing makes you want to dance, sing, soar, be held and be free. I was filled with an urge to both dive into the ocean, and to breathe in the world deeply.' Suzie Miller, author of Prima Facie  'In this exploration - fossick, ramble, dance, even romp - in search of good ways to live on alone after losing a husband whose loss has laid waste to her, Ailsa Piper's many-sided humanity flowers and shines. It is not a dark book - it is a cornflower-blue and sun-filled book, looking death, which is always hovering, straight in the eye.' Robert Dessaix, author of What Days Are For  'If it takes a community to raise a child, Ailsa Piper shows us that it also takes a community to draw a person away from the tilting world of sudden grief to find a new accommodation with life. One beat-perfect scene made me gasp with the hard question it asks and the even gutsier answer it provides. Filled with Piper's characteristic warmth and intelligence, For Life is also a superbly drawn portrait of a place and the precious everyday doings of the natural world. A beautifully put-together story told with skill, candour - and love.' Vicki Hastrich, author of Night Fishing   'Tender and wise. A story about loss that shines with life, like the shattered sea glass Piper collects on Sydney shores ...' Kristina Olsson, author of Shell   'A deeply companionable read. Quiet, profound and full of wonderment.' Hannie Rayson, author of Hello Beautiful  'A love letter to the past, present and future, and a beautiful demonstration of one true path to immortality-through memory and sharing story.' Ashley Hay, author of A Hundred Small Lessons   'For Life is a love letter. Readers will want to carry it with them.' Sarah Sentilles, author of Draw Your Weapons and Stranger Care   'For Life evokes stillness, clarity, appreciation. It left me more attentive to life, its beauty and challenges, my own idiosyncrasies, the delicacy of love. What a gift.' Tim Baker, author of Patting the Shark","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51757035946257,"sku":null,"price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51757036241169,"sku":"GOR014392850","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9781761470868.jpg?v=1759228807"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-ailsa-piper.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}