Amal el-Mohtar's lyrical magic

Here's Manda's round up of (some of) the best books, poetry and podcasts she's come across this year.   Most of the links are to Bookshop.org in the UK where you can link to an independent bookshop of your choice.  In some cases, we've linked to the authors' website.

Fiction

Rachel Neumeier - Rihasi, Marag, Sekaran, Hedesa - all four are part of the TUYO series. 8 Doors from Dawn to Midnight is a stand alone. 

Natasha Pulley - The Hymn to Dionysus

Antonia Hodgson- The Raven Scholar  

 +

Katherine Addison - The Tomb of Dragons

Amal El Mohtar  - The River has Roots

Jacqui Morris and Tamsin Abbott - Wild Folk  Wild Gods Rising - Podcast with the authors

Richard Morgan Altered Carbon

Becky Chambers A Long Way to A Small Angry Planet

Poetry: 

You better be Lightning by Andrea Gibson

A Map to the Next World: Poems and Tales by Joy Harjo (YouTube Interview on the Power of Poetry) 

Non Fiction  

Economic Space Agency (Dick Bryan, Jorge Lopez and Akseli Virtanen)  Protocols for Post Capitalist Expression 

Richard Schwartz and Thomas Hübl - Releasing our Burdens: A Guide to Healing Individual, Ancestral and Collective Trauma

Julie Brams The Nature Embedded Mind: How the Way We Think Can Heal Our Planet and Ourselves

Tristan Gooley  How to Read a Tree: Clues and Patterns from Roots to Leaves 

Justine Afra Huxley and Anna Kovasna  Co-creating with a Living Intelligent Earth: Pathways towards Kincentric Leadership

Eliezer Yudkowsky & Nate Soares If Anyone Builds it, Everyone Dies: The case against superintelligent AI

PODCASTS

Nate Hagens The Great Simplification: If Anyone Builds it, Everyone Dies: How Artificial SuperIntelligence Might Wipe Out our Entire Species w Nate Soares

Your Undivided Attention: Feed Drop: “Into the Machine” with Tobias Rose-Stockwell

Upstream - A World out of Balance: Introducing Doughnut 3.0 w Andrew Fanning 

Point of Relation with Thomas Hübl: Becoming an Ally of Life 

Love and Philosophy by Andrea Hiott: Moving Beyond Binaries in Eduction: Andrea Hiott in Conversation with Tim Logan of Future Learning Design

Future Learning Design What’s Love Got to Do with Education? A Conversation with Dr Laura Penn, Khadija Shahper Backthiar, Jamie Bristow and Andrea Hiott

Step Outside, Stand Still Pauline Leitch

Magazine

Permaculture Magazine Subscriptions

What we offer: Accidental Gods, Dreaming Awake and the Thrutopia Writing Masterclass

If you'd like to join our next Open Gathering offered by our Accidental Gods Programme it's  'Dreaming Your Year Awake' (you don't have to be a member) on Sunday 4th January 2026 from 16:00 - 20:00 GMT - details are here

If you'd like to join us at Accidental Gods, this is the membership where we endeavour to help you to connect fully with the living web of life.
If you'd like to train more deeply in the contemporary shamanic work at Dreaming Awake, you'll find us here.
If you'd like to explore the recordings from our last Thrutopia Writing Masterclass, the details are here