Elixir

The mark of a good book is that it changes you. Sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. Nan Shepherd, Robin Wall Kimmerer and Jay Griffiths have all wielded that power over me, but I’ve rarely been so aware of an internal change being wrought, word by word, as I have these past days immersed in Kapka Kassabova’s alchemical prose. I fancy she had me under her spell from page one * Guardian, Book of Day *Her ability to bring out the best in her subjects is born of a genuine horror at the unsustainability of the ways we live… But Elixir is not a lecture… Like the forests and fells it inhabits, it is by turns dark and mysterious and beautiful. Ecologically minded writing can often tell too much and show too little, but Kassabova sensibly lets the landscape and locals do the talking. * Financial Times *Uplifting and beautifully written… Elixir provides a glorious cycle of stories and personal testimonies. * Spectator *Subtle prose that mingles empathy with perspective. * Economist *Humanity glitters under her gaze in all its facets. Her prose is spectacularly good and her storytelling is a joy. – Philip Marsden, author of Rising GroundA laudable attempt to record an endangered region and a disappearing way of life. * Times Literary Supplement *Exceptional. * BBC Wildlife *This is a book to make you feel. * Scotsman *In her captivating latest, Kassabova transports us to the Mesta River in her native Bulgaria… Kassabova finds hope that this ancient knowledge still has the power to heal us. * Bookseller, Editor’s Choice *Extraordinary… She allows her book to grow and swell, like a symphony, expanding and deepening its themes until the traditional wisdom and life of the mountain envelopes you entirely. Rather like a spell, in fact. * Country Life *

Kapka Kassabova is a prize-winning writer of non-fiction and poetry. Her recent Balkan quartet includes Anima (2024), Elixir (2023), To the Lake (2020) and Border (2017). Border won a British Academy Prize, the Scottish Book of the Year, Stanford-Dolman Travel Book of the Year, the Highland Book Prize and the Prix Nicholas Bouvier. It was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. The French edition of To the Lake won the Prix du Meilleur Livre Etranger (non-fiction). Kassabova grew up in Sofia, Bulgaria, and studied in New Zealand. Today she lives by a river in the Scottish Highlands.