Mannie Coe’s memoir a healing book set in the Andalusian hills

A memoir that charts the restoration of an old house in the Andalusian hills became the backdrop against which author, Manni Coe, was able to begin the journey to heal from his past.
The house, a 150-year farmstead, becomes the focus of the book, alongside all the people who pass through it not just in the present but in its long history as well.

“This is a book about love, this is a book about Spain, this is a book about olive oil, this is a book about Andalusia, this is a book about family,” Mr Coe said of Little Ruins at the Gibunco Gibraltar Literary Festival.

Interviewed by Marlene Dalli, Mr Coe said this was the first book he set about writing but was the second book published after “Brother, do you love me?” based on his relationship with his younger brother, Reuben.

Mr Coe and his partner, Jack, were living in Torremolinos when they decided that they wanted to buy a home in Spain.

The idea was to buy an old house in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by olive trees.

After a long negotiation with its previous owners, Mr Coe and his partner signed the paperwork and finally had it in their possession.

“When I first saw it, it was what I'd imagined in my mind,” said.

To get to the house visitors would have to cross a river, and during inclement weather Mr Coe, Jack and Reuben would find themselves cut off from the rest of the world.

The house, the restoration project, and the land surrounding their new home provided a safe outlet for Mr Coe “where only the truth can set [him] free”.

The walk from the house to the boundary fence of the property and back became “a part” of his healing journey.

Each person involved in the restoration is written into the book, and the title for the book came from Maleli, who told Mr Coe, “We all have little ruins inside of us”.

During the restoration of the house, lovingly called The Corner, the residents reached out to other villagers for help on all aspects including the history of the house, the plants that could grow there and also what chickens to have on the land.

It was until a tragic event unfolded with one of the volunteers that Mr Coe came to the realisation that he needed to work on his own deep-seated trauma from when he was a child.

It was while he was working with a psychotherapist that he was able to get to the essence of what happened to him within the church.

He also came out to his parents when he was in his early 20s and fled England to Portugal and had a mini breakdown until his father went to rescue him.

Mr Coe said he had to be “gentle” with his writing as others have been gentle with him.

“I've tried to find compassion within the writing,” Mr Coe said.

“There are almost impressionistic portrayals of what happened, rather than being photorealism.”

Mr Coe said he does not want this trauma to identify him, adding that this book has helped him to “process it all”.

“I’m one step further towards being the person I always wanted to be,” he said.

“Because that’s the thing about abuse, it is that it strips you of that identity, it derails you and it sets you on a path that was never meant for you.”

“So you have to go back to that point of pain and pick the way you were and refine the way that you were supposed to go.”

The book was launched by Mr Coe at Southwark Cathedral earlier this year.

In August he launched a podcast called Life is a Labyrinth where he speaks to other survivors of traumatic pasts.