The Accidental Tour Guide
Adventures in Life and Death
Published on 23. September 2019
352 pages
978-1-925791-36-5 (ISBN)
Description
The Year of Magical Thinking meets Salvation Creek in a powerful memoir of love, loss and discovery - the third act in an extraordinary life.
Mary Moody's bestselling memoirs about her adventures in France, Au Revoir and Last Tango in Toulouse, inspired thousands of women. The Accidental Tour Guide completes the circle by sharing another major turning point in her life.
When Mary loses her beloved husband, her world is turned upside down. Part of her journey to reignite her passion for living is to boldly go where she has never been before - in her travels and in her everyday life.
A powerful, moving and inspiring true story about how to rebuild your life without the people who matter most.
Mary Moody's bestselling memoirs about her adventures in France, Au Revoir and Last Tango in Toulouse, inspired thousands of women. The Accidental Tour Guide completes the circle by sharing another major turning point in her life.
When Mary loses her beloved husband, her world is turned upside down. Part of her journey to reignite her passion for living is to boldly go where she has never been before - in her travels and in her everyday life.
A powerful, moving and inspiring true story about how to rebuild your life without the people who matter most.
More details
Person
Mary Moody trained as a journalist at the Australian Women's Weekly in the 1960s. In the 1970s she moved to the Blue Mountains with her young family and became a passionate organic gardener. She wrote and edited countless gardening books and magazines, and was a presenter on the ABC's top rating Gardening Australia for ten years. In 2000 Mary spent six months living alone in a medieval village in southwest France. At the end of her sabbatical she bought a house nearby that she still visits every year. She wrote four memoirs about her experiences, including the bestselling Au Revoir and Last Tango in Toulouse. Today she leads horticultural tours in France, Morocco and the Himalayas. After the death of her husband David Hannay in 2014, Mary moved back to the Blue Mountains where she is developing a large garden in an extended family home with her son and his family. She has eleven grandchildren.
Content
- Intro
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- Part 1: Losing David
- Chapter 1: The beginning
- Chapter 2: Diagnosis
- Chapter 3: My crazy family
- Chapter 4: The clinic
- Chapter 5: Finding my feet
- Chapter 6: Leaving David behind
- Chapter 7: Country life
- Chapter 8: Preparing for the worst
- Chapter 9: Margaret
- Chapter 10: David
- Chapter 11: Vancouver Island
- Chapter 12: Therapy times
- Chapter 13: Love and madness
- Chapter 14: A French fantasy
- Chapter 15: Hoarding
- Chapter 16: Happiness
- Chapter 17: Mercy dashes
- Chapter 18: Getting on with things
- Chapter 19: Help arrives at last
- Chapter 20: Reflections
- Chapter 21: Ups and downs
- Chapter 22: Goodbye Margaret
- Chapter 23: A hopeful time
- Chapter 24: Family times
- Chapter 25: A new family member
- Chapter 26: A short-lived escape
- Chapter 27: A true celebration
- Chapter 28: Not what I was expecting
- Chapter 29: The tipping point
- Chapter 30: The moment of truth
- Chapter 31: Home
- Part 2: After David
- Chapter 32: The days after
- Chapter 33: Into that good night
- Chapter 34: Reality hits
- Chapter 35: Feeling my way
- Chapter 36: Time for something new
- Chapter 37: Home again
- Chapter 38: An extreme adventure
- Chapter 39: A house is found
- Chapter 40: Auction anxiety
- Chapter 41: A room of one's own
- Chapter 42: Loving reunions
- Chapter 43: A fascinating destination
- Chapter 44: Ageing outrageously
- Epilogue: Vale
- Photographs
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
- Copyright
