Mountain Song

In the vein of Nan Shepherd's The Living Mountain and Mary Oliver's gentle writing on nature, Mountain Song is Lucy Fuggle's love letter to adventure, slowing down, and quietly noticing the beauty of wild places during her three transformative years spent living by the Swiss Alps.

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In 2016, Lucy Fuggle made the unexpected decision to live alone with the company of glacier-covered mountains, alpine flowers, and soaring eagles in the picture-perfect mountain town of Meiringen by the Swiss Alps. This is the inspiring story of her next three years and the ups and downs of living simply and in tune with nature.

"Here in the silence and surrounded by mountains, I’m starting to find my answers, at least for now. I want to be moulded by the world: by the people I’ve loved and the places I’ve sat and listened quietly, watching leaves falling, the sun rising and stars appearing..."

Growing up painfully shy and with high-functioning autism, Lucy found new mental and physical courage in the natural world around her traditional Swiss chalet, living alone with a view of towering peaks and waterfalls. In summer, she explored every trail around her house, including the Via Alpina trail 400 km across Switzerland. The coldest time of the year saw her switch hiking for freezing lake swims, snowshoe hikes, and glacier treks.

As her relationships, career, and inner life changed – for better and for worse – she ventured further into the wild around her for comfort, answers, and acceptance. In the silence and loneliness, she found the space to step into who she really was, no matter what others thought of that.

This is her quietly inspiring and soothing story of the ups and downs of living simply, quietly and in tune with nature and the transformation it can bring, accompanied by beautiful photographs and pen and ink sketches. Surrounded by some of the most striking scenery in Europe, Lucy finds a slower pace of living and exchanges insecurity for courage, changing the course of her life beyond recognition.