Ay e Metin - a 38-year-old mother from Istanbul - decides to tackle the Lycian Way in southern Turkey. She has never camped alone in her life. As she strikes out into Lycia's ancient forests, she is on a quest to leave behind the past. But the Lycian Way is a footpath steeped in memories. Unknown to Ay e, as she clambers over the precipices of the Mediterranean coast and through the lost cities of the trail, she is walking in someone else's footsteps. 2500 years earlier, when Lycia was an independent state and worshipped the Goddess Leto, the Persian general Harpagos was stomping along the...

I couldn't teach another lesson. Nor could I tolerate another day with a boss, a punch card, and the indigestion I suffered from bolting my muesli. This was why I'd spent the past five months camping in a remote Turkish field. Then the first winter storm crashed through the valley, turning my tent into a canvas pole dancer. It dawned on me I might need a house. There were only two problems: I had just $6000 left in my account, and 6 weeks before winter.

"Despite having very little money, almost no building experience, and endless naysayers who told her she would fail, Atulya K. Bingham...