Stanfordville, NY – April 14, 2026 – “We have been humbled and honored to be a small part of this journey with Jessica. This truly was special,” says Active Riding Trips president, Stacey Adams, referring to a specific mention of the Hudson Valley travel agency, and its Ring of Kerry trip in Ireland, by author Jessica Shannon in her new book, The Sum of Grief, A Daughter’s Memoir, published by sutrahouse.com.
Jessica Shannon is a board-certified chaplain and writer in Magnolia, Texas, who earned her Bachelor of Arts from Sweet Briar College and Master of Divinity from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary. She and Adams connected when the author sought to realize the trip to Ireland she and her mom had always dreamed about. Active Riding Trips offers nine horseback trips in Ireland, including a week of riding the Ring of Kerry on Gypsy Vanner and Irish Draft horses.
“When I was a teenager,” Shannon says, “I learned that my paternal grandmother and great aunt had wanted to explore Ireland. I told my mom, and she lit up as one of her ‘great ideas’ hit her: we’d go on a girls’ trip. It would be the family matriarchs, my mom and me. Mom said we’d ride horses in Ireland while our elderly relatives relaxed at the hotel. My grandmother was thrilled with the idea. We never got to take the trip. My mom died suddenly in 1998 when I was 17. My grandmother died in 2002, and my great aunt died in 2020.
In 2025, she told Adams, she turned the age her mom was when she died. “I decided to honor that significant grief math milestone, and the women in my family, by taking that trip. Active Riding Trips made my grief trip happen. I rode horses along the Ring of Kerry and felt more connected to my mother and family matriarchs than ever before. That trip healed something in me that I didn’t know still needed tending to, and I am forever grateful to Stacey, her team, and Killarney Riding Stables.”
Adams calls this Active Riding Trip “as thrilling as anything we’ve ever done on a ride, and leaves you breathless and grinning from ear-to-ear at the same time. The area of Killarney and Ring of Kerry is one of the most scenic parts of Ireland, as folks love to explore the peninsula of Inveragh framed by the McGillicuddy Reeks. The views of slated roofed villages giving way to coastal paths leading to the Atlantic never grows old for the riders on Gypsy Vanner or Irish Draft horses wending their way through some of the most bucolic scenery in Ireland.”
About The Sum of Grief
Jessica Shannon lost her mother at 17, and 27 years later wrote the book she needed then and could not find. What does it mean to live without the person you loved most? In The Sum of Grief, the chaplain and grief counselor explores the arithmetic of loss – the calculations we make when measuring days against the absence of someone who shaped them. Drawing from her own experience and years of walking alongside the grieving, she offers a framework that validates what so many feel but rarely hear spoken aloud: grief isn’t a problem to solve. It’s the proof of how deeply we loved. The Sum of Grief: A Daughter’s Memoir is available for pre-order now – and read the opening chapter for free — on sutrahouse.com. To be released later this spring.
About Active Riding Trips
An award-winning premier provider of horseback riding vacations since 2003, Active Riding Trips offers more than 100 curated adventures based on good horses, great food, and conscientious cooperation with hosts’ cultural and natural environments.
Among the advantages to booking with Active Riding Trips are impartial advice on which ride is best suited to your dream trip and no difference in price (assuming the same trip) than if booked direct. Guaranteed. ActiveRidingTrips.com.
Media Contact:
L.A. Berry
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