I’ve long been a believer in readerly serendipity: many times in my life I have discovered a book when I needed it most. Or perhaps it’s that I still believe books can save me, and so I will hew answers to life’s questions out of whatever is in front of my eyes—like a dedicate of astrology will interpret the horoscope to exactly suit her own needs.

Either way, when I bought a copy of Helen Macdonald’s H Is For Hawk from the famous Blackwell’s bookstore in Oxford, on an early November day last year, it was the very book I needed to read right then. I found myself in Oxford on the one day of the week when all the major museums were shut, and it was cold, and I was undone. New heartaches were hurting me, and old griefs had surfaced again. I couldn’t face walking through the city for hours, my nerves exposed and raw, so instead I sat and read this book. Sitting still and reading a book has been my survival strategy for as long as I can remember.