INTRODUCING MY DEBUT BOOK: NATURAL CONNECTION

The secret is out!

Over the last three years, I have been writing my first book, NATURAL CONNECTION and I am so excited (and petrified) to be able to finally share it with you! 🥹

Sharing this news with you, just days after returning from Ghana, conducting my final PhD research trip, almost three years exactly since I signed my book deal on my very first PhD research trip to Ghana feels so special – it is such a full-circle moment.

NATURAL CONNECTION will be published by Penguin Vintage/ Square Peg Penguin on April 17th 2025 and is now available for pre-order!

If you pre-order your copy now, the book will land on your doorstep on publication day (17th April 2025), and payment won’t be taken from your account until then! Pre-ordering takes less than a minute but makes a massive difference for debut authors, letting bookshops know that there are people who want the book!

ABOUT NATURAL CONNECTION

We are witnessing the uprooting of community and the living world at the hands of colonial, capitalistic and monocultural systems: systems that erode our collective resilience in the face of ongoing disaster – systems from which we must become untethered.

What these intersecting crises we are now witnessing provide us with is an invaluable opportunity to unearth and resist these acts.

NATURAL CONNECTION is a love letter to the living world and the frontline communities who have, and continue to pave the way for today's environmental movement in spite of traumatic pasts and presents. It is also an offering to anyone craving deeper relationships with the Earth and others amidst the intersecting ecological, climate and social crises.

In the book, I present 6 key alternative roots necessary to cultivate a natural connection between ourselves and the living world: RAGE, IMAGINATION, INNOVATION, THEORY, HEALING and CARE. These roots represent practices, teachings and considerations for environmental action inspired by the legacies and ongoing resistance of marginalised communities.

I hope the book can leave you as transformed as I have been by the histories that precede us, to find a new and grounded view of your relation to the world and the power you have to reshape it.

Take these stories, inhale them, be moved, enraged, excited and energised by them, and let them help you nurture a natural connection with the world.

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BEHIND THE COVER

The design for the cover of NATURAL CONNECTION, like many things in the living world, emerged through a winding, non-linear journey full of peaks and valleys.

Whilst the book centres on our connection with the living world, at its core, it speaks to the inherent interconnection and interdependence of humans and nature, a fact that Indigenous and marginalised communities around the world know only too well.

The image on the cover is of a man from the Baka (Bakaya) community of West Africa, who, with immense skill, scale trees as tall as 130 feet in order to search for widely coveted wild honey.

But the Bakaya natural connection to the forests they live in has, over the years, been threatened by colonial and exclusionary approaches to conservation. Three years ago, as Climate Columnist for Gal-Dem (RIP), I wrote about the Baka in my article on Why Indigenous land rights are key for protecting the planet. I detailed the violence and physical abuse that Baka communities in Congo were experiencing from forest guards in the process of formalising Boumba Bek/Nki forest as a National Park, experiences which were confirmed by a UN Development investigation in 2020.

Conservation is essential for biodiversity and planetary health, but the dominant ‘fortress’ model, with its roots in colonial violence and inherently discriminatory and unjust practices, misguidedly imagines “wild” spaces as those void of humans.

We cannot foster a natural connection with the world, building more abundant and safe futures, by further harming and marginalising the communities who live closest to the landscapes we are trying to protect. The Baka’s connection to the forest is based not only on their proximity to the forest but also on their belief that “the forest is [their] foster mother”. They follow a practice of “regeneration, being based upon respect for the rhythms of nature”.

Safeguarding our natural world isn’t about severing the natural connection between humans and the living world. It’s about finding the beautiful balance of mutually beneficial coexistence.

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A MOMENT OF GRATITUDE

Writing this book, I have felt the presence of my eight-year-old and seventeen-year-old selves – the former full of curiosity and enthusiasm, the latter full of pain and fear – who would both be bowled over to know that, as they dreamt so many times, they are now a published author. I am immensely grateful for all who have come together, in many different ways, to make the dreams of those two girls a reality.

The beginnings of this book took root in the summer of 2021 when I met my wonderful agent, Emma Leong, who not only encouraged me to embark on this journey but poured an immense amount of energy, care and guidance to bring these pages to life. Thank you, Emma, for your fierce and unwavering confidence in me as a writer, even when I have been unsure of it myself.

My deepest thanks to my editor, Marianne Tatepo, for believing in and moulding me as well as this book. Looking back at where this text started and then at the one we hold in our hands now, it is undeniable that your wisdom, vision and ambitions for this book have shaped and helped me grow immeasurably as a writer. Thank you to the rest of the team at Penguin Vintage and Square Peg – Emily Martin, Graeme Hall, Binita Roy, Mia Quibell-Smith, Matthew Broughton, Rowena Skelton-Wallace – who have read, edited, designed, marketed and made possible this book.

The heart of this book lies in the legacies, stories, victories, losses and lessons of the Indigenous and marginalised communities who have seeded positive change shaped the environmental movement and transformed the world through their actions. It is through their enduring worldviews, practices and work that a natural connection emerges, for which I am eternally grateful. These stories are accompanied by an incredible constellation of interviews.

I feel immensely privileged to have been able to connect and converse with so many individuals who inspire me and whose work I deeply respect. Thank you to all those who shared their time, thoughts and insights with me – Robert Macfarlane, Rebecca Solnit, Katherine May, Olafur Elliason, Merlin Sheldrake, Obatala Efunwale, MorningStar Khongthaw, Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Willow Defebaugh, Lucy Jones, Jessica J. Lee, Daze Aghaji, Báyò Akómoláfé, Sammy Oteng, Yvette Dickson-Tetteh, Adenike Oladosu, brontë velez, Mya-Rose Craig, Zena Holloway, Isaias Hernandez, Seth Hughes, Julia Watson, Miranda Lowe, Kalpana Arias – some of which made it into these pages and others that didn’t make the final draft. I give thanks to all the skilled and inspiring writers who have come before me, whose pages I pored over and whose ideas have shaped the way I think about and move through the world.

So much of this book took shape in stolen moments, mornings, evenings, and weekends as I juggled writing with my PhD research, running ClimateInColour and ongoing commitments to my media and communications work. This book was born in the cracks between months-long field trips in the forests in Ghana, countless hours writing academic papers and my doctoral thesis and travelling for national and international engagements and appearances. This juggle would not have been possible without the patience, support and generosity of so many people. To my academic supervisors, Alan Blackwell, Jennifer Gabrys, Adham Ashton-Butt and Emmanuel Acheampong, thank you so much for enabling me to undertake this work and for your mentorship, guidance and advocacy.

To my manager, Viv, thank you for your big heart, kindness and friendship and for steering the ship of my career. Thank you to my family for their undying support and belief, for listening to me brainstorm, rant and vent, and for sharing their honest and helpful thoughts throughout the many stages of writing this book. Thanks especially to my mother for instilling in me, from an early age, my love for reading and writing and for being a model of determination, perseverance and grace that I aspire to every day. Thank you to my godmother, Aunty Augusta, for being such a steady and strong source of inspiration, motivation and wisdom. Thank you to Amelia for your continual encouragement, for special days writing in your home by the river, and for your ever-perceptive thoughts and comments.

And lastly, my love, Jasper. Thank you for your undying confidence and belief in me, for reading thousands of words countless times, for holding me and steadying me, for feeding and nourishing me, for championing me. For the natural connection we have fostered with each other over the last eight years. Thank you.

And to you, for all your support, community, inspiration and engagement over the years, AND for pre-ordering NATURAL CONNECTION.

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