Stone Will Answer – Beatrice Searle

Wild Writers Festival 2024

presents

Stone Will Answer – Beatrice Searle

A compelling memoir, travelogue and insight into an intricate craft, artist and stone mason Beatrice’s Stone Will Answer is a most unusual adventure story.   

In her mid-20s, Beatrice crossed the North Sea and walked 500 miles through Southern Norway on a medieval pilgrim path to Trondheim, taking with her a 40-kilo stone from the west coast of Orkney. She had recently completed her masonry training at Lincoln Cathedral and become fascinated with the mysterious footprint stones of Scandinavia and Northern Europe – stones closely associated with travellers, saints and the inauguration of Kings.   

In an incredible feat of endurance, she follows in their footsteps on a unique adventure during which her stone becomes a kind of talisman as well as an offering to those she meets along the way.   

It’s a physical, spiritual and geological journey in which she explores what lessons might be learned from stone, what we choose to carry with us and what we return to put down or pick up again. Beatrice appears in conversation with Anna Fleming, author of Time on Rock. 

 “A story of dedication and tenacity that is deeply moving and utterly captivating … a beautifully crafted tale of an artist’s extraordinary journey.” Sally Huband, author of Sea Bean