Birders and book lovers should like this one...

H is for Hawk wins Costa Book of the Year

Helen MacDonald's H is for Hawk has just won the Costa Book of the Year award in London, England.   In November of last year the same book also won the Samuel Johnson Prize in Britain.   Prize money for Ms MacDonald, for the two awards totals approximately $104,000 Canadian.  The book was also  short-listed for the Booker Prize, in its non-fiction category.   H is for Hawk is a lyrical depiction of the relationship between human, wild bird of prey, and enduring emotional loss.   Her biographical memoir of being grief-stricken upon the death of her father and then turning to the technical training of a Goshawk named Mabel, has been described by the chair of the judging panel, novelist Robert Harris, as "...brilliantly written, muscular prose and staring at grief with the unblinking eye of a hawk...it was a very clever, accomplished bit of writing that wove everything together".   The author, who had been a falconer from the age of 13, was struck by grief upon the the death of her father and "became obsessed" with training a hawk; a task at which her father had failed.   The book "has been acknowledged as a modern classic," Mr. Harris said.   Several of the the judges "felt very passionately it was a book that haunted them and they would never forget it."   Well, I'm off to Indigo Books to get my own copy of this highly praised book.
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BtheB