Essays can be as beautiful and insightful as poetry and that is certainly the case with this new collection from Helen Macdonald. They also allow for a wide range of topics to be covered and again Macdonald achieves this, maintaining the interest of the reader with the variety of knowledge that she imparts, while unifying the whole collection with powerful insight into the nature of humanity.

Her writing sweeps, rises and glides from the personal experience of a single child meeting a parrot in a beautiful moment of emotional connection between boy and bird, to the scientific search for evidence of life on Mars, but it is all held together in the self-awareness of a species that holds itself aloof and superior to the natural world from which it can learn so much. It is a book to which the reader can constantly return and will find succour in different essays and insights each time.

In Swan Upping Macdonald gives sense to my own feeling of love for the local bringing admiration for the universal. Local traditions are not, or should not be, about national fervour and superiority to an other, but rather a shared love we all have for the places that define and sustain us. She separates the gentle patriotism of us each caring deeply for the local environment that we live in to create a patchwork of distinct but unified and sustainable life, from the aggressive nationalism of deluded superiority that creates destructive schisms in our world.

The essay that gives the book its name, Vesper Flights, is the story of swifts. These birds each evening and morning fly high above the clouds to break away from the atmospheric impacts of landscape and recalibrate themselves. At these heights they can see weather patterns that will impact their daily lives and they can locate themselves with the Earth’s magnetic fields.

Not every swift makes the flight, some are too caught up in the day to day needs of rearing chicks and feeding, but the community as a whole can plot its course and keep on track through the wisdom of those that do. Back here in the human world who makes Vesper Flights for us, who guides our communities to keep us located in our world and aware of the winds that will impact our futures?

This is far more than simply a collection of essays about the natural world, it is a series of reflections about what it means to be human and how we fit into that world. Macdonald is a naturalist but also a spiritual guide for our species, leading us to reflect deeply and grow. Vesper Flights is an inspirational book that, once published in hard copy, will sit on my shelf alongside Dillard, Kingsolver and Berry, to be returned to constantly as food for my soul.

An almost autobiographical volume of Helen’s life to date that shows how great a naturalist she is and has been fro a very early age. She teaches us about so many things - murmurations, swan-upping, goats, ostriches and wild boar to name but a few. She paints an extremely vivid picture of nature and wildlife on every page.

A very moving personal chronicle and a most interesting read

I have to admit that I was attracted by the cover and hadn't realised that Vesper Flights was a collection of essays written over a period of time.
As might be expected, each of the chapters was met by me with a varying amount of interest.
Helen Mcdonald is exceptionally adept at mixing personal anecdotes and observations, while relating her immense knowledge of natural history. This makes it an easily digestible read.
The book takes its title from a phenomenon performed by swifts in the evening and at dawn. This essay alone is worth the cover price.

I read Helen Macdonalds H is for Hawk a few years back now whilst on holiday in the UK. I simply adored it. The story, the writing style, and of course, the great goshawk. I went out and bought 3 more books all about birds as i was just so in love with the romanticised image of them etched out in H is for Hawk.
It is no wonder then, that i was so excited to read Vesper Flights.
A collection of essays penned by Helen Macdonald, this is not my usual preferred read, however, Macdonald manages to maintain a steady flow through each piece of writing, that has you almost hypnotised, reading on and on.
She has a way of dropping in snippets of her vast knowledge, that i just found so very interesting. For example, the way in which the migrating birds flying through New York get trapped in the light 'towers' that shine as part of the 9/11 memorial, causing the lights to be turned off every so often to release them once more.

This is a book to read whilst sitting out in your garden, on a chilly day, listening to the birds.

To be human is to see ourselves as the center of the world, to hold nature at an arms length and look at it as a mirror of ourselves; separate from us but not entirely discrete; a reflection of our needs, our thoughts, and our lives.Vesper Flights; a collection of over 40 luminous narrative essays by the acclaimed naturalist Helen Macdonald; brings the natural world out of the woods not as an entity we have dominion over but as something beautifully complex and worthy of sav(our)ing for reasons beyond the ones we ascribe and assume.

Ask someone about science and you would be told that it is a pursuit of both knowledge and pleasure—the same also holds true for reading. However, in cleansing itself of the lyricism inherent to nature as modern science overwhelmingly does, it often perverts both knowledge and pleasure into something that is by definition dispassionate and utilitarian, which is how we regard the non-human today. In Vesper Flights, Helen Macdonald mixes science and naturalism, social commentary and memoir into a sort of transcendent literature that can communicate the "qualitative texture of the world" and (re)turn nature to explicable magic—something that we value and can urge ourselves to save.

Whereas H is for Hawk made us look afresh at the way we connect to nature, this book surpasses it vastly in merit: it examines the intersection of humanity and 'habitat' on a wider and far deeper plane, covering the ways in which we interact with animals, birds and the ecosystem on both personal and on cultural/community levels. Macdonald has a gift for subtlety as well as poetry, and weaves in socio-political conditions (including Brexit, nationalism, and the crisis of immigration) with personal recollections and factual information with breathtaking, thought-provoking ease.

Here, migraines become the perfect metaphors for our approach to climate change; the distress of changing childhood landscapes is contextualised against worries just as great; and migratory birds and cold war politics come together. Here, I learnt about people like Nathalie Cabrol; about Aeroecology, mushroom, swifts, berries, and bearded reedlings; abut field guides, and how nature can be man-made—fascinating things that I would never have known otherwise and am all the more grateful for. Some of my favourites essays in this volume were "Tekels Park," "Migraines," "The Student's Tale," "Ashes," "Swan Upping," and "Rescue"—all full of hard facts as well as emotions, of the mundane and the extraordinary, of love and respect for diversity being sown and nurtured. This is a book I desperately wanted to finish for all I would have known and cherished and the end of it, but also one that I wished would never end.

I can't wait to actually purchase my own physical copy of this book: so much to underline, so many sections I'd like to photocopy and pass under people's doors. So many reasons to commend this book onto people's bookshelf.

Vesper Flights is a luminary collection of short essays about the relationship between humans and the natural world.

While it lacks the emotional build or impact of H is for Hawk, the essay format does allow Macdonald to address a whole range of issues. The short form means that each word is perfectly weighted, and every page is packed with images that leave a lasting impression. At times the flux of language is a little overpowering, like wading through dense forest. Macdonald's words have the most power when they are stripped back: she has the remarkable ability to unpick weighty themes in a single image. The way she renders a bird in flight is like an glimpse of the meaning of life.

Vesper Flights is the kind of non-fiction collection that I can imagine re-reading over in years to come, and learning something new every time.

A collection of essays, full of emotion, fear, despair, happiness, curiosity, amusement, passion, sadness and political opinion. An intriguing insight into the world that is Helen Macdonald, uniting the author's wit, observations and writing style, covering topics such as stargazing to climate collapse and Wild Pigs to Ostriches. Nature meets the human race.
I did not know what to expect from the author, as I had not read any of her past works. I enjoyed each essay and was disappointed when I got to the end. I highly recommend and will certainly read more by Helen.
I want to thank NetGalley, Random House UK, Vintage Publishing and Helen Macdonald for a pre-publication copy to review.

A lovely collection of essays and anecdotes giving an insight in to Macdonald's world and the everyday natural world.

This is a beautiful book, a joyous book but also a sad and thought provoking book. It is also possibly the best book that I will read this year, and I look forward to owning my own copy when it is published later this year.

This is a collection of stories from childhood through to adulthood and every place in between, stories from the UK and around the world. Each one is wonderful and unique in it’s own right and yet as a collection I don’t think I’ve ever come across one that is so well put together before. They are a nature insight, a personal story with feeling. Whether it is Golden Orioles or Fallow Deer, Swifts or Goat tipping (I’m not telling – you’ll have to read the book), these are all unique stories but instantly relatable. Written with love and emotion; sometimes they make you smile, sometimes they make you cry and sometimes they send you off into your own personal rabbit hole about a particular species.

I savoured every story, I took my time reading and in some cases rereading a story, I learnt new things about species that I thought were familiar and new things about species I’ve never come across before. I was reminded about times I’ve had similar experiences and felt moved to go out and explore and experience something for myself.

I can’t recommend this book enough, whether you are drawn to natural history books or not this is worthy of your time and money and if you know someone who is into their natural history then this is probably the perfect gift for them.

Now I’ve finished reading, I want to go back and read the whole book again, although I will probably wait until I get my hands on a publication copy.

Reading 'Vesper Flights', I was reminded of why 'H is for Hawk' was such a hit. Simply, Macdonald's way with words is breathtaking. Enthralling.

I consumed this collection of essays. I experienced the full gamut of emotions - love, fear, dread, joy, wonder, amusement, anger, grief. Macdonald often waxes lyrical about the dizzying scale of the natural world, both at the micro and macro level, and in a way, her book parallels this. She zeroes in on specific, momentary experiences, and pans back out to the bigger picture. From astronomy to mushroom-picking. From swan-catching to climate breakdown. Not a big nature nut? No worries. There's a balance between humans and non-humans in the essays, and plenty of quirky and fascinating people among these. I won't go into any further detail than that - I wouldn't want to spoil a moment of it for any reader.

There are so many lines in this book that I had to earmark for returning to in the future. And so many facts and so much wisdom to glean. If only our politicians had a fraction of Macdonald's sense and empathy - we wouldn't be destroying our own future.


(With thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy, in exchange for an honest review)