The Snag

Shortlisted for the 2025 OCM Bocas Prize for Nonfiction

Every day, we hear about and experience griefs, large and small, in our families, friendships, communities, and worldwide. The grief of a loved one passing. The grief of a way of life ceasing to exist. The grief of global pandemic, war, climate collapse.

In The Snag, the acclaimed author of Shame On Me, Tessa McWatt, takes on personal and collective grief, and climate change, in her much-anticipated second nonfiction book.

As her mother’s dementia advances and it becomes apparent that she can no longer live independently, Tessa considers griefs personal and political, and finds solace in trees. She asks: How do we grieve? And: What can we learn from nature and those whose communities are rooted in nature about how to grieve — and how to live?

From the newest seedling, to the oldest snag in the forest, there is meaning to be found in every stage of a tree’s life, all of which contribute to a thriving forest community; it is in this metaphor that Tessa begins to find answers to her questions about how to live (for each other), how to grieve (radically), and how to die (with love and connection).

The Snag is an essential book about living and dancing and singing and praying, even in the face of unimaginable sadness, and in this way, growing together and supporting one another, like the trees in the forest.