Author(s): KEVIN PARR

Mind Body Spirit

A lyrical exploration of mental health and nature, set to the phases of the moon. The ancient Celts lived by and worshipped the moon. In a quest to find a more harmonious way of being, Kevin Parr discovers how a year of moons has much to teach us about how we live within the world that surrounds us. January's Quiet Moon reflects an air of melancholy; it is the time of the Dark Days for the ancient Celts, when the natural world balances on the edge of a knife. By May, the Bright Moon brings happiness, time slows and the mood lifts. Mayflies cloud and elderflowers cascade. With the descent into winter comes the sadness of December's Cold Moon. Yet it is the Blue Moon that surprises Kevin most as stoat packs charge, buzzards grapple and salmon leap. While modern, digital life is often at odds with nature, rubbing against it rather than working in harmony with it, Kevin explores how being more in tune to the rhythms of the world around us, even in the cold and dark, can help ease the suffering mind. AUTHOR: Kevin Parr is a writer, fisherman and naturalist. He is the author of the critically acclaimed Rivers Run (2016), which was longlisted for the inaugural Richard Jefferies Prize for Nature Writing. He is a monthly columnist for BBC Countryfile Magazine and the angling correspondent for The Idler magazine and has written for the Daily Telegraph and Independent. Kevin lives in West Dorset with his wife and a colony of grass snakes a few strides from his garden gate. 14 b/w illustrations