The Circling Sky

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What to expect

From a 2018 Wainwright Prize shortlisted author, THE CIRCLING SKY is part childhood memoir, blended with exquisite nature observation, and the story of one man's journey over a year to one of the UK's key natural habitats, the New Forest of Hampshire

In the form of several journeys, beginning in January 2019, Neil Ansell returns for solitary walks to the New Forest in Hampshire, close to where he was born. With beautiful sightings and observations of birds, trees, butterflies, insects and landscape, this is also a reflective memoir on childhood, on the history of one of the most ancient and important natural habitats in the United Kingdom, and on the Gypsies who lived there for centuries - and were subsequently expelled to neighbouring cities. It is also part polemic on our collective and individual responsibility for the land and world in which we live, and how we care for it.

As Neil Ansell concludes so eloquently, 'Evolution has no choice in what it does, but we do, as a species, if not always as individuals'.

(P)2021 Headline Publishing Group Limited

Critics Review

  • A beautiful evocation of life in a forest and a powerful reminder of the interconnected fate of all wild things, including ourselves

    Raynor Winn
  • Like taking a refreshing and eye-opening walk in the open air with the most interesting, observant and companionable of guides. In The Circling Sky Neil Ansell reveals the remarkableness of the relatively unexotic New Forest, moving deftly from personal reflection to beautiful nature writing, to a crucial, timely argument about the history and importance of common land.

    Naomi Ishiguro
  • Neil Ansell’s series of walks in the New Forest through the course of a year coalesce into a skilful exploration of memory, childhood, and how certain landscapes can become an integral part of your life. Ansell is a gifted naturalist, sensitive, inquisitive, at times justly enraged, invariably joyful. The Circling Sky is a wonderful tribute to a unique and precious place

    James Macdonald Lockhart
  • The Circling Sky reads like a vivid and subtle nature programme for your mind’s eye. Its New Forest setting is a world within a world; a fragile Eden with an utterly astonishing cast of birds; a unique harbour to an array of species both familiar and unexpected, and a complex, sometimes dark human history. At times it felt like Danny the Champion of the World had grown up, lived an intriguing life, and was now communicating his subtle life philosophy as he walked among the trees. I finished this book sharing its author’s desire to look closer, to “walk in peace”, and – as he puts it – to “camp without camping”, and simply fall sleep beneath a tree.

    Damian Le Bas
  • Top-class nature writing. The book is a poetic meditation as well as a forthright argument. Ansell is among my most-admired British nature writers’

    Rebecca Foster, shinynewbooks.co.uk
  • Neil Ansell is a wonderful guide…this is a delight of nature writing

    Choice magazine

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