The Land in Our Bones: Plantcestral Herbalism and Healing Cultures from Syria to the Sinai--Earth-basedpathways to ancestral stewardship and belonging in diaspora Paperback – February 13, 2024

One of my favorite books ever, Layla shares an abundance of knowledge, lore, culture, and love in her very honest and well written offering.

As a person of Lebanese/Syrian descent who grew up on turtle island very disconnected from my ancestral culture, I felt insecure and confused of where to even start to find my way back to my roots. Discovering Layla’s work including this book has transformed my life in so many ways.Before this, I’d gone down many dead ends, including “new age” spirituality and “place medicine” that really focus only the the individual and don’t get into the deeper questions that would always bother me. How can I actually show up? What do I *do* with new information? How can I connect to others?I believe this book will be extremely helpful to anyone who is seeking a way to approach life, healing, activism, and of course, working with plants and the earth. It clears away so much nonsense and encourages you to seek your own agency and rootedness, not in a “quick fix” but a remembrance of essential things that in our culture have been forgotten or confused.Layla does not shy away from “the political” as many people in this sphere do, because there is really nothing more “political” than the land. She is honest and grounded, empathetic and fierce, her decades of experience in community organizing power her ideas and her poetic communication ensures they will hit home.Her love and deep reverence for her ancestral homeland and its people shine through so strongly, and this extends as well to lands we find ourselves in diaspora. I deeply appreciated how she made the connections between these places and highlighted the contradictions and possible paths forward.Do yourself a favor and get this book, and check out Layla’s work and wonderful offerings. The work is yours to do, someone like Layla will be a wonderful guide towards your own liberation and the liberation of us all. 🤍

Feghali’s book is well researched and well written. It pulls together the threads of herbalism, culinary traditions, culture and diaspora, with a vast historical context of colonialism from ancient to present day.Highly recommend!

Great recipes n herbal wisdom

This book is gorgeous, required reading for anyone eager to raise up and listen to ancient, land-centered Levantine wisdoms around health and being. It's beautifully written, and my marked up --heavily underlined!!-- copy sits on my bookshelf and will be a reference volume of mine for decades to come. So appreciative that Layla turned her empathic curiosity on the rituals and rites of her and my culture-- reading it softened the ache of being a diasporic person, severed from my motherland and its ways.I've gifted three copies already and know it will continue to be a go-to gift!

I love this book. As an Assyrian, I felt so seen and was honored to see my people mentioned on the first page. Thank you for writing this amazing book, I love learning from it and want to share it with all my friends interested in learning more about SWANNA herbalism and indigenous practices.

Layla does a phenomenal job of writing a book that helps us re-member. In these times of division & fracture, it's just so necessary to be reminded of ways we can reconnect into the earth & earth through plants. As a person with Ancestry in Levant (or Canaan), Layla shares wisdom that I am so grateful for. May we all work towards a future where all beings are free.

Would highly recommend.