Falcon by Helen Macdonald

$9.99 NZD

Category: Books of Buderim | Series: Animal Ser. | Reading Level: near fine

Before best-selling author Helen Macdonald told the story of the goshawk in H Is for Hawk, she told the story of the falcon, in a cultural history of the masterful creature that can “cut the sky in two” with the “perfectly aerodynamic profile of a raindrop,” as she so incisively puts it. In talon-sharp Before best-selling author Helen Macdonald told the story of the goshawk in H Is for Hawk, she told the story of the falcon, in a cultural history of the masterful creature that can “cut the sky in two” with the “perfectly aerodynamic profile of a raindrop,” as she so incisively puts it. In talon-sharp prose she explores the spell the falcon has had over her and, by extension, all of us, whether we’ve seen them “through binoculars, framed on gallery walls, versified by poets, flown as hunting birds, through Manhattan windows, sewn on flags, stamped on badges, or winnowing through the clouds over abandoned arctic radar stations.”             Macdonald dives through centuries and careens around the globe to tell the story of the falcon as it has flown in the wild skies of the natural world and those of our imagination. Mixing history, myth, and legend, she explores the long history of the sport of falconry in many human cultures—from Japan to Abu Dhabi to Oxford; she analyzes the falcon’s talismanic power as a symbol in art, politics, and business; and she addresses the ways we have both endangered and protected it. Along the way we discover how falcons were mobilized in secret military projects; their links with espionage, the Third Reich, the Holy Roman Empire, and space programs; and how they have figured in countless stories of heroism and, of course, the erotic.             Best of all, Macdonald has given us something fresh: a new introduction that draws on all her experience to even further invigorate her cherished subject. The result is a deeply informed book written with the same astonishing lyrical grace that has captivated readers and had everyone talking about this writer-cum-falconer.   ...Show more

H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald

$39.99 NZD

Category: Biography & Memoir | Reading Level: very good

'In real life, goshawks resemble sparrowhawks the way leopards resemble housecats. Bigger, yes. But bulkier, bloodier, deadlier, scarier, and much, much harder to see. Birds of deep woodland, not gardens, they're the birdwatchers' dark grail.' As a child Helen Macdonald was determined to become a falcon 'In real life, goshawks resemble sparrowhawks the way leopards resemble housecats. Bigger, yes. But bulkier, bloodier, deadlier, scarier, and much, much harder to see. Birds of deep woodland, not gardens, they're the birdwatchers' dark grail.' As a child Helen Macdonald was determined to become a falconer. She learned the arcane terminology and read all the classic books, including T. H. White's tortured masterpiece, The Goshawk, which describes White's struggle to train a hawk as a spiritual contest. When her father dies and she is knocked sideways by grief, she becomes obsessed with the idea of training her own goshawk. She buys Mabel for GBP800 on a Scottish quayside and takes her home to Cambridge. Then she fills the freezer with hawk food and unplugs the phone, ready to embark on the long, strange business of trying to train this wildest of animals. 'To train a hawk you must watch it like a hawk, and so gain the ability to predict what it will do next. Eventually you don't see the hawk's body language at all. You seem to feel what it feels. The hawk's apprehension becomes your own. As the days passed and I put myself in the hawk's wild mind to tame her, my humanity was burning away.' Destined to be a classic of nature writing, H is for Hawk is a record of a spiritual journey - an unflinchingly honest account of Macdonald's struggle with grief during the difficult process of the hawk's taming and her own untaming. At the same time, it's a kaleidoscopic biography of the brilliant and troubled novelist T. H. White, best known for The Once and Future King. It's a book about memory, nature and nation, and how it might be possible to try to reconcile death with life and love. ...Show more

H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald

$22.99 NZD

Category: fortium simium | Reading Level: very good

As a child, Helen Macdonald was determined to become a falconer. Years later, when her father died, she became obsessed with the idea of training her own goshawk. She bought Mabel for  £800 on a Scottish quayside and took her home to Cambridge, ready to embark on the long, strange business of tryin As a child, Helen Macdonald was determined to become a falconer. Years later, when her father died, she became obsessed with the idea of training her own goshawk. She bought Mabel for  £800 on a Scottish quayside and took her home to Cambridge, ready to embark on the long, strange business of trying to train this wildest of animals. Her story is an unflinchingly honest account of Macdonald's struggle with grief during the difficult process of the hawk's taming and her own untaming.WINNER OF THE 2014 SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE The Birds and the Bees series was designed for Vintage Classics by Timorous Beasties, the Scottish studio famous for their designs inspired by the natural world. ...Show more

Overcoming Chronic Pain : A Self-Help Guide Using Cognitive Behavioral Techniques by Frances Cole, Hazel Howden-Leach, Helen Macdonald, Catherine Carus

$35.00 NZD

Category: Health & Wellbeing

Chronic pain does not need to dominate your life. The health team behind this book has established a self-help method based on techniques tested with patients in community and hospital programs.

Recovery: Vintage Minis by Helen Macdonald

$9.99 NZD

Category: Biography & Memoir | Series: Vintage Minis Ser.

The hawk was everything I wanted to be- solitary, self-possessed, free from grief, and numb to the hurts of human life How do we carry on when someone close to us dies? Is it simply a case of putting one foot in front of the other in a bleak new world or do we need something more? Reeling with grief aft The hawk was everything I wanted to be- solitary, self-possessed, free from grief, and numb to the hurts of human life How do we carry on when someone close to us dies? Is it simply a case of putting one foot in front of the other in a bleak new world or do we need something more? Reeling with grief after the sudden death of her father, Helen Macdonald found herself turning to the wild for comfort. With breathtaking honesty and insight, she recounts her months spent taming a goshawk and how, finally, this strange kinship led her to the first tentative steps to recovery. Selected from H is for Hawk VINTAGE MINIS- GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. A series of short books by the world's greatest writers on the experiences that make us human Also in the Vintage Minis 'Head Space' series- Therapy by Stephen Grosz Family by Mark Haddon ...Show more

Vesper Flights by Helen Macdonald

$24.00 NZD

$26.00 (7% off)

Category: Biography & Memoir

*A BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE GUARDIAN, FINANCIAL TIMES, DAILY TELEGRAPH, INDEPENDENT, BBC SCIENCE FOCUS MAGAZINE AND TIME MAGAZINE**A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER**A RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK*Animals don't exist to teach us things, but that is what they have always done, and most of what they teach us is what w *A BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE GUARDIAN, FINANCIAL TIMES, DAILY TELEGRAPH, INDEPENDENT, BBC SCIENCE FOCUS MAGAZINE AND TIME MAGAZINE**A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER**A RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK*Animals don't exist to teach us things, but that is what they have always done, and most of what they teach us is what we think we know about ourselves.From the bestselling author of H is for Hawk comes Vesper Flights, a transcendent collection of essays about the human relationship to the natural world.Helen Macdonald brings together a collection of her best-loved writing along with new pieces covering a thrilling range of subjects. There are essays here on headaches, on catching swans, on hunting mushrooms, on twentieth-century spies, on numinous experiences and high-rise buildings; on nests and wild pigs and the tribulations of farming ostriches.Vesper Flights is a book about observation, fascination, time, memory, love and loss and how we make the world around us. Moving and frank, personal and political, it confirms Helen Macdonald as one of this century's greatest nature writers.'Thrilling dispatches from a vanishing world... A powerful - and entertaining - corrective to the idea that the only hopes that matter on this planet are those of our own species' Observer ...Show more

Vesper Flights - New and Collected Essays by Helen Macdonald

$37.90 NZD

Category: Essays & Anthologies | Reading Level: very good

Animals don't exist to teach us things, but that is what they have always done, and most of what they teach us is what we think we know about ourselves. From the internationally acclaimed author of H is for Hawk comes Vesper Flights, a transcendent collection of essays about the human relationship to th Animals don't exist to teach us things, but that is what they have always done, and most of what they teach us is what we think we know about ourselves. From the internationally acclaimed author of H is for Hawk comes Vesper Flights, a transcendent collection of essays about the human relationship to the natural world. In Vesper Flights Helen Macdonald brings together a collection of her best loved pieces, along with new essays on topics and stories ranging from nostalgia and science fiction to the true account of a refugee's flight to the UK. Her pieces ranges from accounts of swan upping on the Thames to watching tens of thousands of cranes in Hungary to seeking the last golden orioles in Suffolk's poplar forests. She writes about wild boar, swifts, mushroom hunting, migraines, the strangeness of birds' nests, what we do when we watch wildlife and why. This is a book about observation, fascination, time, memory, love and loss and how we make the world around us, by one of this century's most important and insightful nature writers. ...Show more