When Helen Macdonald’s father died suddenly on a London street, she was devastated. An experienced falconer – captivated by hawks since childhood – she had never before been tempted to train one of the most vicious predators, the goshawk. But in her grief, she saw that the bird’s fierce and feral temperament mirrored her own. Resolving to purchase and raise the deadly creature as a means to cope with her loss, she adopted Mabel and turned to the guidance of T. H. White – author of The Once and Future King and The Goshawk – to begin her challenging endeavour. Projecting herself ‘in the hawk’s wild mind to tame her’ tested the limits of Macdonald’s humanity and changed her life.