Walking Through Shadows
A Journey of Loss and Renewal
by Mike Cawthorne
£12.99
- Paperback
- E-Book
109 in stock
Reviews
A tribute to a close friend who died trekking in the mountains, Cawthorne writes a gripping account of his expedition over 135 peaks of Scotland. He shows there’s more to mountaineering than having the right equipment – a strong head and a determined heart are just as valuable
Scottish Field
Cawthorne is a fine descriptive writer
Scotsman
A spellbinding book ... Nothing is romanticised here: this is raw, powerful writing that comes from a place of both great emotional intensity and intellectual depth
The Great Outdoors
About the Book
Walking Through Shadows describes a winter walk in memory of the author’s friend, Clive Dennier, a popular Inverness journalist, who died in Knoydart in March 2013 but whose body was found only some weeks later. The journey begins at Whiten Head on the north Sutherland coast and ends at Kinloch Hourn in Knoydart, the place where Clive was eventually found. Mike Cawthorne undertook the walk with his friend, Nick (also a friend of Clive’s), from mid-January to late February 2015. Their walk traversed the wildest and most remote areas of Britain, often in atrocious winter conditions. The walkers were entirely reliant on food parcels buried beforehand.
As well as describing some the last wild places in Scotland in the heart of winter the narrative explores themes of grief, chance, mental illness and ecological damage. The author’s companion is struggling throughout with the effects of severe mental illness but sees in the walk the hope of some relief from this suffering. The walkers are asking a question: whether the hills can heal at a human level and whether the hills can themselves be healed. In the shadow of the Anthropocene Mike Cawthorne evokes the darkness of winter, of two individuals seeking answers, alone in a freezing wilderness that is both beautiful and moribund. In the context of an extreme mountaineering adventure, he is grappling with issues of vital importance to us all.
The Author
Mike Cawthorne
Mike Cawthorne began hill-walking on Ben Nevis aged seven, and has been climbing mountains ever since. He has worked as a teacher, professional photographer and freelance journalist. He has an intimate knowledge of the Scottish Highlands, undertaking his first longdistance trek there in 1982. His first book, Hell of a Journey: On Foot through the Scottish Highlands in Winter (2000, new edition 2007) was short-listed for the Boardman-Tasker Prize for mountain literature. His second book, Wilderness Dreams, was published in 2007. He lives in Inverness.
