ONE OF STYLIST'S BEST NON-FICTION PICKS FOR 2024'A mind-altering and supremely generous exploration of kinship, selfhood, memory and the roots we share' NAOMI KLEIN, AUTHOR OF DOPPELGANGER'A lucid and compelling memoir of family rupture and repair and the power of plants to anchor us in the world' SUE STUART-SMITH, AUTHOR OF THE WELL-GARDENED MIND__________Three months after Kyo Maclear's father dies, a DNA test reveals that they were not biologically related. All at once Kyo's mother becomes unknown to her; she has a big story to tell, the story of a secret buried for half a century, but her memories are fading. Words are failing them both, so she looks to gardening - her mother's second fluent tongue - to bridge the gap between them. Unearthing is written in the wild green language of soil, seed, leaf and mulch. A memoir of inheritance that goes far beyond heredity, this is the story of what happens when we give up the weeded and pruned plots of our family histories and open ourselves up to a more expansive view of kinship. Told through the passage of seasons, with beautiful illustrations by the author, it is a deeply thoughtful meditation on race, lineage and grief and a tender testimony to the ineradicable love between a mother and a daughter. PRAISE FOR UNEARTHING: 'A lyrical and at times cryptic meditation on nature, kinship and the lives of both humans and plants' NEW STATESMAN'I could not put this gorgeous book down... at once vulnerable and precise, gentle but unforgettable' JESSICA J. LEE'Fierce, loving, inquisitive, devastating - this book got under my nails, and into my heart' LULAH ELLENDER'A masterful lyric exploration of identity, inheritance and belonging in the wake of an unsettling discovery... absorbing and transformative' POLLY ATKIN'A tender and precious gift of a book, that holds out grief like an opening flower. Deeply moving, beautifully written and delicately delivered' VICTORIA BENNETT
Industry Reviews
'Magnificent...I will never forget it' - Dani Shapiro, author of Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love
'A mind-altering and supremely generous exploration of kinship, selfhood, memory, and the roots we share across time, space and species' - Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine and This Changes Everything
'In this beautiful book Kyo Maclear unravels the knotty stories we inherit - and create - about who we are and where we come from. With deftness and clarity she ranges from meditations on memory, belonging and truth, to the earthy tangibility of the garden. Fierce, loving, inquisitive, devastating - this book got under my nails and into my heart. I loved it' - Lulah Ellender, author of Grounding
'Unearthing is a masterful lyric exploration of identity, inheritance and belonging in the wake of an unsettling discovery, that deftly queries what makes us who we are, and what happens when the stability of our foundations is challenged. It investigates nature, nurture and genetic legacies, who our parents are before and beyond us, and who we become because or despite them. Both seasonal, contemporary and spiralling through botanic and genetic time, the writing is absorbing and transformative; the story will grow through you' - Polly Atkin, author of Some of Us Just Fall: On Nature and Not Getting Better
'A lucid and compelling memoir of family rupture and repair and the power of plants to anchor us in the world' - Sue Stuart-Smith, author of the Sunday Times Bestseller The Well Gardened Mind
