Is A River Alive?

by Robert Macfarlane

• Hardback
• 384 pages
  
• Signed by the author
• Pre-Order Now! Released: 1st May 2025

Independent Bookshop Edition signed and stamped by the author, with exclusive end papers (Artist: Daniel Coe) and a ribbon marker. 

Also includes additional content - an extra page at the end of the book containing a 'Riversong', a broadsheet poem written by Robert Macfarlane and illustrated by Nick Hayes.

Pre-Order through us to receive a Limited Edition Pin Badge (featuring the cover artwork from the inimitable Stanley Donwood) with your order!  

From celebrated writer Robert Macfarlane comes this brilliant, perspective-shifting new book – which answers a resounding yes to the question of its title. At its heart is a single, transformative idea: that rivers are not mere matter for human use, but living beings – who should be recognized as such in both imagination and law. Is a River Alive? takes the reader on an exhilarating exploration of the past, present and futures of this ancient, urgent concept.

The book flows first to northern Ecuador, where a miraculous cloud-forest and its rivers are threatened by goldmining. Then, to the wounded rivers, creeks and lagoons of southern India, where a desperate battle to save the lives of these waterbodies is under way. And finally, to north-eastern Quebec, where a spectacular wild river – the Mutehekau or Magpie – is being defended from death by damming in a river-rights campaign.

At once Macfarlane’s most personal and most political book to date, Is a River Alive? will open hearts, spark debates and lead us to the revelation that our fate flows with that of rivers – and always has.