Twelve Moons: Finding strength on the edge of nowhere

The most beautiful and inspiring memoir you’ll read in 2023

TWELVE MOONS is a year spent caught between the wild sea and the changing moon of the wide Northumberland skies – a healing memoir of recovery, survival, motherhood and identity.

Caro is a single mother living on the edge of the country, with her tribe of daughters: The Mermaid, The Whirlwind, The Caulbearer and The Littlest One. She is at once alone and yet surrounded. Bound by financial constraints, her eldest daughter’s illness, and the aftershocks of marital breakdown, she has nowhere to go but the fierce landscape that surrounds her.

Ultimately, the sea will become what saves the whole family. When they cannot be in the sea there is always the moon. And when the sky is drenched in cloud, they see the pull of the moon in the tides. Over the course of the year, the moon becomes their guide, and TWELVE MOONS follows the lunar calendar, each chapter representing a month and a moon.

TWELVE MOONS shows the simmering power that lies in unheard lives. Set against wide beaches and ancient hills, this is a story steeped in nature and legend, by turns reflective and urgent, gentle and fierce. Caro and her daughters walk themselves into the landscape, making the place their home, their solace and their strength.