We're really looking forward to welcoming Polly Atkin to the bookshop for an event to celebrate the publication of her new memoir, Some of Us Just Fall: On Nature and Not Getting Better. This memoir explores the realities of chronic illness within the context of the natural world and the idea of the "nature cure". Atkin will be in conversation with writer and translator Annie Rutherford.

This event will take place in the bookshop with an in-person audience, as well as a livestream for attendees watching from home.

Livestream vouchers are valid until the day after the event and can be redeemed on our website against a single copy of Some of Us Just Fall.

After years of unexplained health problems, Polly Atkin's perception of her body was rendered fluid and disjointed. When she was finally diagnosed with two chronic conditions in her thirties, she began to piece together what had been happening to her - all the misdiagnoses, the fractures, the dislocations, the bone-crushing exhaustion, the not being believed. Some of Us Just Fall combines memoir, pathography and nature writing to trace a fascinating journey through illness, a journey which led Polly to her current home in the Lake District, where outdoor swimming is purported to cure all, and where every day she turns to the natural world to help tame her illness.

Polly delves into the history of her two genetic conditions, uncovering how these illnesses were managed (or not) in times gone by and exploring how best to plan for her own future. From medical misogyny and gaslighting, to the illusion of 'the nature cure', this essential, beautiful and deeply personal book examines how we deal with bodies that diverge from the norm, and why this urgently needs to change. This is not a book about getting better.

This is a book about living better with illness.

Polly Atkin – Some of Us Just Fall