Goshawk Summer: The Diary of an Extraordinary Season in the Forest

WINNER OF THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE FOR NATURE WRITING 2022

James Aldred’s prize-winning lockdown diary of his summer in the New Forest, featuring a stunning new linocut cover by illustrator Nick Hayes

’Magical and transporting... a beautiful and deeply evocative hymn to love, hope and connection.’ HELEN MACDONALD, author of H is for Hawk

What happens to nature when we are no longer there? In early 2020, wildlife cameraman James Aldred was commissioned to film the lives of a family of goshawks in the New Forest. Then lockdown. No more cars, no more airplanes, no one in the woods - except James - in a place empty of people but filled with birdsong and new life.

In these silver nights and golden days, there were tumbling fox cubs, calling curlew and, of course, the soaring goshawks - shining like fire through one of our darkest times. A goshawk summer unlike any other; an extraordinary season in the forest.

James Aldred is the celebrated author of The Man Who Climbs Trees and an Emmy Award-winning documentary wildlife cameraman & filmmaker. He works with TV and production companies worldwide, including the BBC and National Geographic. He has collaborated with Sir David Attenborough on numerous projects including ’Life of Mammals’, ’Planet Earth’ and ’Our Planet’ and has been nominated for BAFTA/RTS awards many times. He was lucky to spend the national lockdown of spring and summer 2020 filming in the New Forest. His resulting book Goshawk Summer won the Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing 2022