Ring of salt a memoir of finding home and hope on the wild coast of Ireland
At twenty-four, Betsy Cornwell runs away to Ireland. Leaving behind a painful past and chasing her lifelong dream of becoming a novelist, she finds a fresh start on the misty shores of the Aran Islands. Amid the beauty of the Irish countryside, her life takes on the glow of a fairy tale when she mee...
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| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Books Print Book |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
New York :
Avid Reader Press,
2025.
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| Edition: | First Avid Reader Press hardcover edition. |
| Subjects: | |
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| Summary: | At twenty-four, Betsy Cornwell runs away to Ireland. Leaving behind a painful past and chasing her lifelong dream of becoming a novelist, she finds a fresh start on the misty shores of the Aran Islands. Amid the beauty of the Irish countryside, her life takes on the glow of a fairy tale when she meets a charming horse trainer and elopes to Gretna Green. Five years later, her happy ending has twisted into a nightmare and Betsy finds herself trapped in an abusive marriage, isolated and afraid with a newborn baby. On her son's first birthday, she runs away, turning to the women around her--her local domestic violence group, a trusted family friend, and an online Smith College alumnae network--for help she'd never known she could ask for. After a brush with homelessness, she struggles to scrape together a living for herself and her son, while her ex's continuing harassment and threats of deportation keep her at risk of permanent separation from her child. On sleepless nights, she scrolls through real estate listings that might as well be castles in the air, and starts to foster an impossible What if she could use her writing to buy a home of her own, one that no one could take away from her and her baby? One that might become a haven, not just for her family, but other single parent artists and writers, too? When she discovers a historic knitting factory and former cinema on Ireland's rugged Connemara coastline, left empty and crumbling for years, that precarious dream becomes her she spends the next two years working to crowdfund the old knitting factory's purchase by sharing its story and her own with her growing online community. But as the deadline to buy nears, she realizes she will have to reckon with everything she believes about family, survival, and what happily-ever-after truly means for her dream to have any chance of coming true. Ring of Salt combines a powerful and all-too-relatable narrative of survivorship and healing with lush writing about the wild landscapes and rich mythology of rural Ireland to craft a real-world fairy tale about ordinary, but no less life-changing, magic we can all vulnerability, community, and the power of telling your own story.--Front and back flaps. This memoir recounts the personal journey of author Betsy Cornwell, who moved to Ireland in pursuit of a writing career and a fresh start. After escaping an abusive marriage with her infant son, she navigated single parenthood, financial hardship, and threats of deportation and permanent separation from her child. Drawing strength from community support and her creative aspirations, Cornwell set out to transform an abandoned knitting factory into a haven for single-parent artists. Blending themes of survival, resilience, and self-reinvention, the book also explores the cultural and mythological richness of rural Ireland. |
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| Physical Description: | 334 pages ; 24 cm |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (pages 333-334). |
| ISBN: | 9781668045299 166804529X |
| Author Notes: |
