Seeking the Light & Truth Within: The Almanac with Lia Leendertz
For the latest video in the series “Seeking the Light & Truth Within”, I travelled to Stanton Drew Stone Circle, near Bristol to interview Lia Leendertz, an award-winning garden and food writer who for the past six years has written the Almanac - a seasonal guide to the year - a best seller.
Lia writes a weekly column for the Telegraph, a monthly column for The Garden magazine and a long-running series on growing and eating seasonally for Simple Things magazine. She also contributes frequently to the Guardian and Gardens Illustrated.
Lia explains how the Almanac is a perfect toolkit for connecting with the world around us and the year ahead as it unfolds – all in a compact and pocket size guide that just begs you to pick it up and browse.
The Almanac: A seasonal guide to 2023 has just been published. It reinvents the tradition of the rural almanac for a new audience. It gives you the tools and inspiration you need to celebrate, mark and appreciate each month of the year in your own particular way. Divided into the 12 months, a set of tables each month gives it the feel and weight of a traditional almanac, providing practical information that gives access to the outdoors and the seasons, perfect for expeditions, meteor-spotting nights and beach holidays. There are also features on each month’s unique nature, such as the meteor shower of the month, beehive behaviour, folklore, seasonal recipes and charts tracking moon phases and tides.
You will find yourself referring to The Almanac all year long, revisiting it again and again, and looking forward to the next edition as the year draws to a close.
PRAISE FOR THE ALMANAC:
‘The perfect companion to the seasons’ - India Knight
‘Indispensable’ - Sir Bob Geldof
‘This book is your bible’ - The Independent
‘An ideal stocking filler’ - The English Garden
‘I love this gem of a book’ - Cerys Matthews
“Thank you SO much for this, Helen, and for making it with such beauty and care. It’s very special.”