Tending

'Exquisite. May writes with extraordinary honesty, grace, and intimacy about the shifting demands that life brings to bear on us. She conjures both internal and external landscapes with clarity, acuity, precision and lyricism. It's an absolute must-read' Helen Macdonald

'All May's books are like candles in the darkness . . . Katherine May is an emotional emergency service!' Caitlin Moran

From the Sunday Times bestselling author of Wintering and Enchantment, comes a heartfelt meditation on the secret labour of care.


When her husband falls seriously ill, Katherine May finds herself thrown into the world of multigenerational care, trying to hold together home and family as they spin determinedly apart. In the midst of this endless cycle of domestic and emotional work, and ever alert to the precarity of the familial threads that threaten to break, May finds solace in the gentle labour of the garden.


With one foot always in the wild, Tending is a timely exploration of connection, community, mortality and how our duties of care shift radically in midlife. Drawing on art, mythology, philosophy and the natural world, it asks what it means to give - and receive - care, capturing both the hardship and the transcendence, and inviting us to see its unsung work as the beating heart of our lives.

'Such careful, beautiful thinking and writing about fear and pain and love and consolation. I loved it' Sarah Moss

'Stunning . . . it's like she's weaved it together with tiny silk threads. So very pleasurable to read' Emma Gannon