Gaining Ground 4pm

Unearthed after half a century, this radical portrait of a woman who leaves her family to live alone in a woodland cabin will pierce the heart of anybody who has ever wanted to escape.

The paperback is available in the shop.

What's the book about?

I swear I loved them all, and I did the best I could. And then I left them, left all of it.

Abra has a perfect-seeming life as a wife and mother: until one day, she walks away, leaving only a note asking her family not to look for her.
In a woodland cabin, her new life alone begins. There are no mirrors, no clocks, no memories: just the squirrels breathing in the forest, and silence of vegetables growing.

Years later, a young woman arrives, and the past-flashes begin. Daughter? A strange word. Is this her? And what will this mean?

Joan Barfoot’s Gaining Ground is a both a provocative meditation on living on your own terms and an exquisite work of art. It calls to anybody who has ever wanted to escape – who has asked what it costs to be wild, to be sane, to be free.

Time and venue

Our book club venue is at our bookshop.

The book club will run from 4-5.15pm

Our book club is free. All we ask is that you buy the book from us, but of course, we don't insist.

If you find that you can no longer make it, please do let us know as soon as you can, by cancelling your ticket on TicketTailor or calling us at the shop during our shop hours. This will then enable us to allocate your ticket in good time to someone on the waiting list.