Saraband

The best of contemporary nature writing from the winners of the inaugural international Nature Chronicles Prize.

The Nature Chronicles Prize is a new biennial, international, English-language literary award founded to celebrate engaging, unique, essay-length nonfiction that responds to the time we are in and the world as it is. Conceived in 2020 to mark the global pandemic, the prize is also a memorial to Prudence Scott, a lifelong British nature diarist who died in 2019.

Contained within this volume are the outstanding nominated entries for the inaugural prize. These winning works express diverse responses to our planet and its life, and together embody the best of contemporary nature writing.

From a Costa Book of the Year winner, Booker nominee and double Granta-selected Best Young British novelist comes a searing portrayal of the gradual uncovering of one woman's past psychological wounds, set in motion by the arrival of an unexpected letter.

In the 1980s, Anna McCormick was an anti-nuclear peace activist. She was used to taking on those abusing their political power, but when she was targeted by abuse herself, it left a wound so deep it would still be reverberating through her life decades later.

In 2020, Anna is teaching nine-year-olds on Zoom, navigating a relationship interrupted by enforced distance, and coping with a teenaged son who cannot leave the house. When an unstamped envelope arrives overnight, the traumatic past she had tried to bury begins to cast its own long shadow on the present.

This is a twisty, heart-racing page-turner and an incisive look at the personal impact of the violence of the state, the police and the villains much closer to home.

From Jim Crumley, the “pre-eminent Scottish nature-writer” (Guardian), this landmark volume documents the extraordinary natural life of the Scottish Highlands and bears witness to the toll climate chaos is taking on its wildlife, habitats, and biodiversity—laying bare what is at stake for future generations.

In this landmark volume, Jim Crumley brings together a sweeping five-year quest to document the seasons and how he has seen them change. It explores the damage to the Earth’s natural rhythms, but also relishes the enduring beauty and wonder of nature itself.

Drawing on his studies of each season over more than thirty years and reworking the volumes in his best-selling Seasons quartet, Crumley has created this unique account of our natural world today.

After a lifetime of immersing himself in the landscapes of Scotland and a handful of other northern countries, Crumley has amassed a body of knowledge and insight and a bank of memorable imagery.

Combining lyrical prose and passionate eloquence, he lays bare the impact of an increasingly chaotic climate and urges us all towards a more daring conservation vision that embraces everything from the mountain treeline to a second spring for the wolf.

Longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and named among the 50 most notable new books from Africa, Castles from Cobwebs follows one girl’s transition from youthful innocence to understanding as she navigates questions about family, identity, and race.

"I'd always known that I was Brown. Black was different though; it came announced. Black came with expectations, of rhythm and other things that might trip me up."

Imani is a foundling. Rescued as a baby and raised by nuns on a remote Northumbrian island, she grows up with an ever-increasing feeling of displacement. Full of questions, Imani turns to her shadow, Amarie, and her friend Harold. When Harold can't find the answers, she puts it down to what the nuns call her "greater purpose". At nineteen, Imani answers a phone call that will change her life: she is being called to Ghana after the sudden death of her biological mother. 

Past, present, faith and reality are spun together in this enthralling debut. Following her transition from innocence to understanding, Imani's experience illuminates the stories we all tell to make ourselves whole.

 A bestselling British birder, naturalist, writer and broadcaster leads us on a springtime journey of discovery through daily walks in the area surrounding his home, highlighting the joys of connecting with wildlife and our environment.

As spring arrives, Stephen Moss’s Somerset garden is awash with birdsong: chiffchaffs, wrens, robins and more. Overhead, buzzards soar, ravens tumble and the season gathers pace. But this equinox is unlike any other. As the nation goes into lockdown, Stephen records the wildlife around his home, with his fox-red Labrador, Rosie, by his side. When old routines fall away, and blue skies are no longer crisscrossed by contrails, they discover the bumblebees, butterflies and birdsong on their local patch.

This evocative account underlines how a global crisis changed the way we relate to the natural world, giving us hope for the future. And it puts down a marker for a new normal: when, during that brief but unforgettable spring, nature gave us comfort, hope and joy.

“Delightful … The lyrical prose elevates Crumley’s detailed descriptions of the natural world he encounters … Readers will be transported by this immersive outing.” Publishers Weekly

A BBC-serialized vision of spring, ravaged by climate change yet still astonishing, by Scotland’s leading nature writer.

Jim Crumley chronicles the wonder, tumult, and spectacle of that transformation, but he shows too that it is no Wordsworthian idyll that unfolds. Climate chaos brings unwanted drama to the lives of badger and fox, seal and seabird and raptor, pine marten and sand martin. Crumley lays bare the impact of global warming and urges us all towards a more daring conservation vision that embraces everything from the mountain treeline to a second spring for the wolf.

With a naturalist’s eye and a poet’s instinct, acclaimed nature writer Jim Crumley traces the place of our first and most famous National Park in the evolution of global conservation and pleads the case for a far-reaching reappraisal of its wildness.

Books of the Year, Mark Avery

The Lake District is one of England’s busiest national parks. Many people believe that wildness is long gone from the fells, lakes, tarns and becks, yet, within its boundaries, Jim Crumley sets out to prove them wrong—to find “a new way of seeing and writing about this most seen and written about of landscapes."

With a naturalist’s eye and a poet’s instinct, he is drawn to Lakeland’s turned-aside places where nature still thrives, from low-lying shores to a high mountain oakwood that is not even on the map. Through backwaters and backwoods, Crumley traces this captivating land’s place in the evolution of global conservation and pleads the case for a far-reaching reappraisal of all of Lakeland’s wildness.

The Mahogany Pod is a moving portrayal of a joyful love affair that was cut short by a terminal illness after just one exhilarating year – and an inspirational account of vulnerability, reconciliation and learning to live fully after loss. 

“Gorgeous … her narrative packs a world of feeling within it, rendering a poignant look at how love can unfold even amid immense loss.” Publishers Weekly, starred review

"A work of literature: beautifully written, meticulously structured and heart-rending." Guardian

What if you knew from the beginning how your relationship was going to end?

When Jill Hopper first met Arif, they were living in a shared house on the island of Osney in Oxford, on the River Thames. Surrounded by willow trees, birds and reflections, it was an idyllic home. But no sooner had they begun to fall in love than Arif was given the news that he had only a few months to live.

Everyone told Jill to walk away, but she was already in too deep. Years later, Jill rediscovers Arif's parting gift—an African seedpod—and finally sets out to trace the elusive patterns that shaped their relationship.The Mahogany Pod is a tender and vital account of what it means to live, and love, fully.

Nominated for two major literary awards, this is an urban nature book telling the story of an historic part of London through its trees, past and present.

Even in the brick and concrete heart of our cities, nature finds a way. Birds and mammals, insects, plants and trees—they all manage to thrive in the urban jungle, and Bob Gilbert is their champion and their chronicler. He explores the hidden wildlife of the inner city and its edgelands, finding unexpected beauty in the cracks and crannies, and uncovering the deep and essential relationship that exists between people and nature when they are bound together in such close proximity.

Beginning from Poplar, the East End area in which he lives, Bob explores, in particular, our relationship with the trees that have helped shape London; from the original wildwood through to the street trees of today. He draws from history and natural history, poetry and painting, myth and magic, and a great deal of walking, observing and listening.