Meet Magdalena the Mapmaker

When we started planning The Inner Atlas, the first question was not about the places. It was about who would take you there. A book that asks you to look at yourself needs a companion you actually want to walk beside, and getting her right took longer than anything else.

Who she is

Her name is Magdalena, and she is a mapmaker. She is an older woman, wise without being solemn about it, and we wanted her to be attractive in the way that some women only become in later life: lined, direct, completely at home in herself. She is of Latin American and English descent, which suits a book that lives in two languages. She wears a shawl, and she pushes her glasses up into her hair and then forgets where they are. A compass hangs round her neck on a ribbon. A pocket watch is never far away.

What she does, and what she does not

Magdalena does not fix you. That was the one firm rule. She does not hand out advice or tell you what a place means. She walks slightly ahead, points at things, and sometimes says something so dry that you laugh at a moment when you did not expect to. Her skill is in pausing at the right spot and letting you notice what you notice.

I think this is what most of us want from a guide, whether in a book or in life. Not a verdict. Someone who has been through rough country and does not pretend otherwise, who says ‘I stood here once and could not go on’ and then simply waits.

A guide who has her own story

As the chapters go on you learn more about her. A mapmaker has her reasons for choosing that work, and they come out slowly, in passing remarks and in small things she carries. We will not say more than that. It is one of the quiet pleasures of the book, and it is better found than told.

You will meet her at the very start, when a parcel arrives at your door with your name on it. After that she is with you for all twenty-six chapters.

The Inner Atlas is in the members area now, in English and in Spanish as El Atlas Interior.