Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age
Katherine May
From the New York Times-bestselling author of Wintering, an invitation to rediscover the feelings of awe and wonder available to us all. Many of us feel trapped in a grind of constant change: rolling news cycles, the chatter of social media, our families split along partisan lines. We feel fearful and tired, on edge in our bodies, not quite knowing what has us perpetually depleted. more
212 pages, Hardcover
First published Riverhead Books
3.64
Rating
7671
Ratings
1050
Reviews
Katherine May
12 books 1071 followers
Katherine May is an internationally bestselling author and podcaster living in Whitstable, UK. Her hybrid memoir Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times became a New York Times, Sunday Times and Der Spiegel bestseller, was adapted as BBC Radio 4’s Book of the Week, and was shortlisted for the Porchlight and Barnes and Noble Book of the Year. The Electricity of Every Living Thing, her memoir of a midlife autism diagnosis, is currently being adapted as an audio drama by Audible. Other titles include novels such as The Whitstable High Tide Swimming Club, and The Best, Most Awful Job, an anthology of essays about motherhood which she edited. Her journalism and essays have appeared in a range of publications including The New York Times, The Observer and Aeon.Katherine’s podcast, The Wintering Sessions, ranks in the top 1% worldwide, and she has been a guest presenter for On Being’s The Future of Hope series. Her next book, Enchantment, will be published in 2023.
Katherine lives with her husband, son, two cats and a dog. She loves walking, sea-swimming and pickling slightly unappealing things.
Community reviews
I was so excited to get this book - after finishing May’s “Wintering,” I went ahead and bought this straight away. This book was all over the place, and frankly sounded more like she was grasping for things to write about and likely had to meet a deadline. There were a few chapters I enjoyed, but I found myself skipping pages towards the end. It tried way too hard to be insightful, and it fell flat. more
I went into this book with a handful of doubt as to whether I could love it as much as Katherine May’s previous book, Wintering. But Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age resonated with me just as deeply. It gently and beautifully guides us to reignite the innate spark of hope, wonder, even magic, that became buried for so many of us through the challenges of recent years. “The awe-inspiring, the numinous, is all around us, all the time. It is transformed by our deliberate attention. more
I was a big fan of Katherine May’s Wintering, which published just before the pandemic and, as if presciently, offers strategies for coping with seasons of depression. Coming after a few years of upheaval and disconnection, this follow-up voices May’s longing for rituals of the transcendent that will allow her to live in harmony and close attention to the world around her. Her usual way of communing with nature and other people was group swims in the sea, but that temporarily stopped with lockdown. She sought alternatives, such as visiting a sacred well with a friend, beekeeping, cultivating a wild garden, and chasing a meteor shower. The Earth – Water – Fire – Air structure is sometimes forced, and the content sparse; like Raynor Winn, May, I feel, was pressured to capitalize on the success of her previous work and quickly publish unfinished and rather nebulous material. more
Katherine May I owe you an apology. Do not let the time between start and finish fool you. I started this book yesterday and finished it today and feel I should apologize for not reading it sooner. This new book is amazing. It’s exactly what many of us experienced and experience during Covid put into words. more
May does not write well, and I’m afraid I was just too irritated to continue beyond page 35. more
I received this book in a giveaway and was so excited to read it, but this book was definitely not my favorite. The title and description really don’t fit the book. It seems like it’s going to be more applicable to everyone, but it’s really just a handful of stories about the author. It tries to come off more insightful than it is and a lot of it is just really surface level and basic. It peppers in some relatable modern day anxieties and post Covid existence, but it just doesn’t live up to what the title is. more
4. 0⭐️lovely | wise | unusualWhat will stay with me:• gentle invitations to really look at the world in front of us• her apt way of describing the sense of disconnection that many of us feel after living through CovidLines I underlined:“That is what I am searching for, the chance to merge into the wild drift of the world, to feel overcome, to enter into its weft so completely that sometimes I can forget myself. ”“How do we worship now. How do we get past the blunt knowing of our disenchanted age and tap back into the magic that we used to perceive everywhere. ”“We need to double down on the storytelling, and find new ways to tell out our meanings. more
The author's Wintering was a major bestseller, so I thought I should see what the fuss was about. Maybe I should have read Wintering itself, because this, her latest, was a disastrous mess which left me disliking her voice on the page so much, I certainly will not be returning for more. Me reading this book:May scrambles madly, searching for what this book should be about; then, in the acknowledgements, she straight-up admits to throwing away several ideas and struggling to figure out what to write about. A kinder editor would have given her time and space to feel passionate about something, but instead she was clearly forced to rush this out to try to capitalize on Wintering. Mostly we hear about how cell phones are bad, the pandemic was harder on Katherine May than anyone else, and some bullshit spiritualism. more
If you, like me, mistakenly took this book for some kind of self-help type book, you will be disappointed. (Though I’ve had Wintering on my TBR for ages I didn’t read it before Enchantment, so clearly I just missed the memo. ) This book is rather a collection of personal essays and the introspections of the author. It was so thought-provoking and profound. I’ve truly never read anything like it before and absolutely devoured it in just a few days. more
”Poate că asta ne este menit să facem: să ne refacem poveștile până găsim în cele din urmă una care să ni se potrivească. ”. more
Q: In Orwell’s Roses, Rebecca Solnit shares the Etruscan word saeculum, which describes “the span of time lived by the oldest person present, sometimes calculated to be about a hundred years. ” This can be understood as living memory, the extent of contact we have with each passing era. “Every event has its saeculum,” says Solnit, “and then its sunset. ” (c)Q:Do I see this in Bert now. Not quite. more
I loved Katherine May's Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times but I'm afraid I don't quite get the point of Enchantment. She begins this short book with a good description of how I feel post-covid, and how I think many others feel - exhausted, disconnected, and isolated. The author then goes on to try and define and search for enchantment: “small wonder magnified through meaning, fascination caught in the web of fable and memory. ” I was still with her at this point, and then she began a series of personal essays divided into Earth, Water, Fire, and Air. May writes about beekeeping, swimming in the ocean, and watching meteors, all of which are quite nice, and maybe even enchanting. more
Was so looking forward to this one but I found it not as strong as Wintering. Some relatable pandemic struggles and advice for reconnecting with nature with good narration but it was a little weird the narrator was trying the author. I would have preferred to hear from her in her own voice. Much thanks to @prhaudio for the complimentary ALC. more
Yeah, so I don't know why I keep trying Personal Growth books expecting something that's going to help me change my life, but here we are. The acknowledgments for Enchantment suggest Katherine May struggled to write it, and while as a writer, it's sometimes necessary to push through those struggles of a book that fights to come together, sometimes the uphill battle is a sign that there isn't really a book to grow where you're trying to plant it. We are in an anxious age, and awakening wonder amidst *gestures at everything* feels impossible for many of us. May's solution points to the typical "slow down, ditch your phone, notice and learn and become intimate with nature" mantra, which feels a bit obvious, and much of the book details her personal forays into new experiences like re-learning to swim and beekeeping. Absent are the privileges and circumstances one must often have to achieve these things, which begs the question: do we really need a(nother) self improvement book by a wealthy white lady who lives by the sea. more
Every year I read scores of books I like, dozens I really enjoy and a handful which I love and become part of my book collection that I’m guaranteed to dip in and out of for the rest of my life. However sometimes another type of book comes along that makes you stop and think about the beauty of words. That show that letter by letter, word by word that something can be created, that ceases to be really about a plot or development, but instead creates a painting through sentences. May has that rare ability and the title of her book sums up what she has created best of all, an enchantment. ‘Enchantment’ is a collection of essays on May’s experiences of the past and present, about the wonders and joy in everyday life and essentially what it is to be human. more
I expected to like this short book much more than I did. It took me 6 weeks to finish (and luckily, the last 50 pages were the best. ) My favorite chapter, "The Seed of All That Exists", the story of her own garden and yard. was in the final sectionI came to the book without ever having read Katherine May in any form or fashion so I felt lost when she talked about Bert (figured out he was her son) and mentioned an H (who must be her partner). It took me a long while to get a sense of what she was writing about. more
One of the greatest compliments I can give a book is to purchase it after I've checked it out from the library and read it. This is one of those books. May is a kindred spirit, and this book is exactly what my weary soul needed to read this summer. more
Full of wonder even amidst the burdens of humanity, this book is an inspiration for anyone who seeks to go beyond the mundane and into the realm of everyday magic, where the elemental and the spiritual meet. Less flowery review: lovely essays, charming writer, every day experiences turned into treasures. . more
Lovely, contemplative writing. I found it a poignant and helpful way to process the pandemic and things I once perceived as settled being decidedly unsettled in a post-2020 world. Many sections were copied into my commonplace book and I can think of several reading friends (online and "real life") who might enjoy this book, though I will say that I think a few spots ring hollow. (IOW, IMO: being spiritul but not religious only gets you so far when you are contemplating vast concepts and your place within the cosmos. ). more
This book tackles the question: Can we move through life with curiosity and tenderness, sensitized to the subtle magic all around but oblivious to the darkness and chaoticness of life. The author tackles this by charging her own stories with humor, honesty, and warmth. She outlines all her struggles with her work, family, and the pandemic, particularly feeling overwhelmed. The author looks to nature and its restorative properties, wondering how we would feel calmer if we reconnected to the beauty and peace around us. The writing is so fantastic and poetic. more
I loved Wintering so much that maybe my expectations were too high for this book. The epilogue was excellent actually, but the rest of the book just seemed too ethereal, too hard to pin down and actually grasp at any narrative thread there may have been that really tied the anecdotes together. I don’t feel inspired to do or to even feel anything after reading this. That and I found some complete untruths within the pages. Such a disappointment. more
Format Read: Hardcover Review: I enjoyed the book Wintering By Ms. May a lot more. There still were a lot of enjoyable sections to this book, but some was dull. Recommended For: Those who wants a short book about life. more
How do I begin reviewing my most anticipated book of the year. Perhaps by saying that I wasn’t disappointed. Since reading Wintering in 2020, I’ve fully joined the cult of Katherine May. I’ve read all of her other works, have listened to her podcast. I’ve picked up books she’s recommended; I follow her on Instagram, I subscribe to her newsletter. more
this book was BEAUTIFUL in every way. i think i took pictures of the words on almost every other page. . more
Vraja lumii e una dintre cărțile care vin ca o mângâiere. Care îți arată și îți amintește că nu e nimic în neregulă cu tine. O carte care îți oferă un strop de magie și îți amintește de vraja lucrurilor mici, esențiale, pe care tindem să le neglijăm, deși nu ar trebui. Chapeau. more
There were some parts that I liked and that felt like I connected with but overall I just think I connect with the writing, I dont usually tend to like books that are too poetic and has a lot of metaphors in the writing, I just want to vibe I dont want to think when I’m reading 🫣. more
I was gifted an advanced copy of this book. I adored Wintering and couldn’t wait for this book to come out. This book, written during the numbing pandemic, is about awakening, revitalizing the frozen parts of our minds that went to sleep like limbs that have remained motionless for too long. It’s about rediscovering—or discovering for the first time—the enchantment, or magic vision in the world—not for the remarkable, but seeing the extraordinary spark in the mundane. It’s about grounding and connecting, and capturing joy and beauty and specialness in our everyday. more
Enchantment is about finding everyday magic. Like Wintering, May shares stories about finding comfort in what surrounds us in difficult times. This also means that it’s like reading a continuation of Wintering, and I was hoping for something else. While Wintering is broadly applicable, Enchantment takes its starting point during the pandemic, and aren’t we all a bit exhausted by the pandemic. I love Mays references to nature and Enchantment is structured around the four elements. more
This was a let down after Ms. May's tremendous book "Wintering. " I understand that she was writing about her experiences during the pandemic and the lock down including items I could relate to such as her problem with reading (particularly fiction which I too experienced) but it ultimately made me a tad depressed to relive that experience. The end was uplifting (bee-keeping, going back to ocean swimming etc) and I again could relate to finding something to bring me joy (going back to traveling for work, yoga, pilates etc) but I didn't hold me as much as Wintering did. more
Thank you to NetGalley and Riverhead books for my eARC. Ok, so I thought this book was good. I really enjoyed Katherine's previous book Wintering. However, I did not connect with this one as much. That is not to say this book was not bad and it did have many wonderful moments. more