Quotes
“It sings. I couldn’t
stop reading.” Mark Haddon, New York Times bestselling author
“Captivating and beautifully written, it’s a meditation on the bond between beasts and humans and the pain and beauty of being alive.” People
“One of the loveliest things you’ll read this year.” Entertainment Weekly
“Macdonald’s first sight of her bird…is one of the most memorable passages I’ve read this year or, for that matter, this decade. The heat of the moment is enough to melt grammar.” Time
“Macdonald’s beautiful and nearly feral book…is so good that, at times, it hurt me to read it. It draws blood, in ways that seem curative.” New York Times
“Helen Macdonald has written a spectacular memoir…She is also a marvelous narrator, evoking the open spaces of her Cambridge fields, the natural violence of a goshawk’s existence, and her crippling fear of mingling with society when she is so bereft. It is all there in her voice, along with a crisp English accent that is such a pleasure to listen to…She slightly lowers her voice to distinguish White’s story from her own journey out of sorrowful madness into a hopeful future. Winner of the AudioFile Earphones Award.” AudioFile
“A well-wrought book,
one part memoir, one part gorgeous evocation of the natural world, and one part
literary meditation…The discovery of
the season.” Economist (London)
“A talon-sharp memoir
that will thrill and chill you to the bone…Macdonald has just the right blend
of the scientist and the poet, of observing on the one hand and feeling on the
other.” Daily Mail (London)
“What [Macdonald] has
achieved is a very rare thing in literature—a completely realistic account of a
human relationship with animal consciousness…It is a soaring performance, and Mabel
is the star.” Sunday Times (London)
“A dazzling piece of
work: deeply affecting, utterly fascinating, and blazing with love and intelligence…a
deeply human work shot through, like cloth of gold, with intelligence and
compassion.” Financial Times (London)