Helm

by Sarah Hall

Helm is a ferocious, mischievous wind - a subject of folklore and awe, who has blasted the sublime landscape of the Eden Valley since the very dawn of time.

Through the stories of those who've obsessed over this phenomenon, Helm's extraordinary history is formed: the Neolithic tribe who tried to placate Helm, the Dark Age wizard priest who wanted to banish Helm, the Victorian steam engineer who attempted to capture Helm - and the farmer's daughter who loved Helm. But now Dr Selima Sutar, surrounded by infinite clouds and measuring instruments in her observation hut, fears human pollution is killing Helm.

Rich, wild and vital, Helm is the story of a unique life force, and of a relationship: between nature and people, neither of whom can weather life without the other.

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Historical Fiction, Magical Realism, Nature, British Literature, Fantasy

256 pages, Hardcover

First published August 28, 2025

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Sarah Hall took a degree in English and Art History at Aberystwyth University, and began to take writing seriously from the age of twenty, first as a poet, several of her poems appearing in poetry magazines, then as a fiction-writer. She took an M Litt in Creative Writing at St Andrew's University and stayed on for a year afterwards to teach on the undergraduate Creative Writing programme.

Her first novel, Haweswater, was published in 2002. It is set in the 1930s, focuses on one family - the Lightburns - and is a rural tragedy about the disintegration of a community of Cumbrian hill-framers, due to the building of a reservoir. It won several awards, including the 2003 Commonwealth Writers Prize (Overall Winner, Best First Book).

Sarah Hall currently lives in North Carolina. Her second book, The Electric Michelangelo (2004), set in the turn-of-the-century seaside resorts of Morecambe Bay and Coney Island, was shortlisted for the 2004 Man Booker Prize for Fiction and the 2005 Commonwealth Writers Prize (Eurasia Region, Best Book).

The Carhullan Army (2007), won the 2007 John Llewellyn-Rhys Memorial Prize and was shortlisted for the 2008 Arthur C Clarke Award for Best Science Fiction.

Her latest novel is How to Paint a Dead Man (2009).

Reviews

[Marcus (Lit_Laugh_Luv)]

"for readers of The Overstory and North Woods"
just take my money already

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel tells the story of Helm, a mischievous wind, which has been wafting over the terrain of Northern England since time began. The storyline covers the entire history of the world, employing characters representative of various epochs, such as a Neolithic tribe, an early Medieval wizard-priest, a Victorian steam engineer, a farmer's daughter, and a scientist who fears that pollution is destroying Helm. The book explores environmental themes and the relationship between nature and humanity.

I particularly enjoyed the introductory and concluding chapters. The chapters in between could not sustain the same level of momentum. It is written in an unusual style, where the reader must think about what part of history is being covered, which is sometimes difficult since it is not told in chronological order. It contains many characters, most of whom play a small role and disappear quickly. This book falls into the experimental category, which for me, usually means it is difficult to become immersed in it. Such is the case here. It is a book I admired in terms of creativity but did not really love the reading experience.

I received an advance reader copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

[Kasa Cotugno · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this miracle of imagination, Sarah Hall presents her argument against man's effect on the weather. The wind has been anthropomorphized in fable and song (They Call the Wind Maria, the Wayward Wind et al), but here it is given a distinct identity, and the respect granted through millenia is threatened by the effects of climate change. Wonderful perspective.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

This short and weird novel was apparently a twenty-year labour of love, and as somebody who's read all Sarah Hall's previous work, it definitely shows. Aida Edemariam pulls together all the threads beautifully in her review in the Guardian, so I won't repeat the same things here. Helm spans millennia, giving us glimpses into the lives of characters from the matriarch of a neolithic tribe to a medieval priest determined to cast out demons to an eighteenth-century wife who wants to stop her husband blowing up the local witch stones to a girl cast into a mental institution in the 1950s to a present-day climate scientist. If this sounds breathless and crowded, it is, but the characters are linked by their location in the Eden Valley in Cumbria and especially by their relationships with Helm. This local wind produces distinctive weather manifestations when it blows, creating a lee wave with a crest of whirling clouds; the track of the wind is powerful, but the force ceases immediately under the cap of clouds. Hall's enormously ambitious book tracks how Helm has been understood across the centuries and the threat posed by climate change to its continued existence. We even hear from Helm itself (or Helmself, as it prefers), jauntily irreverent: 'People have been giving Helm a hard time For Ever for being Helm. But, whatever, not bothered (OK, maybe a bit bothered)... It's true, Helm might have absorbed some negativity... Probably human-related (no offence). They can have that effect.'

I genuinely admire Hall as a writer, and I also admire what she was trying to do here, so I'm sorry that I found Helm such a consistent slog, especially as almost all its other early readers seem to have loved it.  For me, one of the big problems was structure: although there are about six or so characters with central threads, their narratives are split into tiny chunks and scattered throughout the book, so just as I felt I was sinking into one person's thought-world, I was jarred out again. Then there are the bits that don't relate to any of these central threads, which I especially struggled with. I had the sense that Hall was enjoying having a play, being a bit silly and self-indulgent, and she's absolutely earned it after her brilliant career, but it didn't make some of the over-egged pastiches any easier to trudge through. Helm (possibly due to Helm) also has a weird obsession with sex, and this especially comes out in the one-off scenes, such as an annoying sequence where a Victorian couple get it on in a hot air balloon. There's a hint of Cloud Atlas about some of Hall's narrators - and yet Cloud Atlas benefited from its nested structure, whereas this is, deliberately, all over the place. The series of final encounters with Helm at the end of the novel are powerful but don't entirely justify what came before.

But as I say: I'm an outlier. If, like me, you enjoyed some sections of this book but couldn't quite get on board with the project, I'd suggest trying one of my favourite Halls instead: The Carhullan Army, How To Paint a Dead Man, The Beautiful Indifference. 3.5 stars.

I received a free proof copy of this novel from the publisher for review.

[Katy Wheatley · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wild epic of folklore exploring the mythic figure of Helm, manifesting in human life and experience as a wind that can drive a person mad. This ranges over time and people for the entirety of human history beyond now into the future. It is slightly sinister and weirdly alluring. It reads at times a little like an epic poem. The writing style gives the feeling of a creepy, everlasting omniscience and a sense of something weird and always slightly out of reach. You have to let yourself go into the flows and eddies of this book, and when you do, it's a richly rewarding reading experience.

[alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

sublime and dreamy - mostly historical, blending climate-fiction with magical realism. expansive, experimental. i think this will stay with me for a while !

[Jack Baillie · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s brilliant. Pulled by the winds through the human history of Northwest England. The narrative voice is rhythmically articulate, so distinctly of its place but not twee. Structurally it feels like a response to Richard Power’s Overstory. Northerners can do it too you know. Maybe even better…

[Adam(ChaosOfCold) · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is a seam of narrative ore running deep beneath our feet, long concealed, as though it had been waiting for writers capable of prising it from the earth. These stories feel mineral, sedimentary—born of place, weathered by centuries, braided like vines across generations. They resist the tyranny of clocks and calendars, moving instead to the slow, cyclical rhythms of landscape and season.

Helm is not simply a novel but a weather-system: a wind with a name, a feral force that prowls through the Eden Valley and across the lives tethered to it. It speaks in tongues older than language, carrying aeons on its breath. Here, history is porous; the Neolithic brushes against the near future, and the stories that emerge ask not only how far we have travelled, but whether the journey has been anywhere at all.

Two decades in the making, the book carries the gravity of that span. Its detail is exacting, its patience palpable, its scope wide as the weather itself. Reading it, I felt the weight of time - slow, accumulating, inexorable - as though the prose itself had been weathered into being. Outside my window, the wind buffets the trees, and I understand why Helm could only be written across such a long arc of years, why its arrival feels necessary now, in an age tilting toward its own unraveling.

Like North Woods, Barrowbeck, or Cuddy, this is a story of place: thick with folklore, attuned to the alchemy between land and life, magic and science, past and what may follow. To read Helm is to be reminded that stories, like winds, return and return again—restless, flawed, human, enduring.

Thanks to Faber for the gifted copy. Helm is out now, wherever you find books.

[Josh]

ARC through NETGALLEY - DNF. wanted to push through this due to it being short but it felt like it was trying a little too hard to be mystic with run ons of descriptive words. Just not my style of writing

[Simon S. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Helm is the UK’s only named wind, localised to the Cross Fell area of Cumbria. Notable for its distinctive rolling, turbulent cloud formations and its destructive force, it has, over time, gathered myth, legend, and scientific study among its many stories.
In this exceptional action-painting of a book, Sarah Hall shows us humanity’s humility and hubris in the face of nature.
From Helm’s perspective, we see the emergence of human society across the Cumbrian wilds: the coming together of tribes, their terror in the face of the crashing gales, and their development of “trinkets” (buildings, vehicles, furniture, clothing) – all toys for Helm’s wild pleasure.
As Helm observes and wonders, we follow a handful of story threads, spread across time, each with Helm at its core: something to be placated, subdued, or studied. Each thread offers glimpses into the society of its time and the oscillating positions of women and men, science and belief, hope and despair, exuberance and restraint.
Helm is an amused and bemused observer, fascinated by the couplings and carnage played out below. A neolithic society seeks the final stone for their circle; a medieval exorcist climbs the hill to cast out the destructive demon Helm; men of science try to study or tame the wild spirit in more secular fashion; and a lone voice from the weather station wonders whether Helm can survive the attrition of climate change.
I absolutely loved this book. Hall paints such vivid pictures with few words, capturing the firing of synapses, the crash-zoom and montage of people in motion, heads full of dreams. The book is funny – particularly Helm’s droll reflections – moving, and thrilling, and each thread has its own tone and reality, each a convincing and satisfying short story of its own. They twist around and through each other, accumulating into a vivid study of our relationship with the full force of nature, something we have battled for as long as we’ve existed – and which, even now, we cannot control, only break.

[Olga · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow, this is one intellectually ambitious book!

A novel that spans millennia, all orbiting a single, feral wind blowing through England's Eden Valley. It’s a high-concept, high-wire act - think Cloud Atlas with a meteorological twist and Elif Shafak’s lyrical touch - and for the most part, Hall doesn’t just stick the landing; she soars.

The premise is breathtaking in its originality. Helm isn’t a setting; it’s a character. A capricious, ancient force witnessed through a dizzying array of lives: a Neolithic tribeswoman trying to appease it, a medieval priest trying to banish it, a Victorian engineer trying to harness it, a modern-day scientist trying to save it from us. Hall’s prose is, as ever, exquisite - precise, muscular, and often breathtakingly beautiful. She writes the natural world with a shamanistic intensity; you can feel the grit of the wind, hear its howl, sense its chaotic intelligence. The environmental thread is woven in masterfully - never a lecture, just a quiet, chilling certainty that our time here is a brief and damaging blip in a much longer story.

But here’s the rub, and it’s a significant one: for all its intellectual grandeur, I found it hard to fully love this book. Connecting with it emotionally was like trying to grasp the wind itself. The structure - a swirling, non-chronological vortex of vignettes - is brilliant conceptually but punishing experientially. Just as you start to settle into one character’s world, to feel the soil under their feet or the fear in their throat, the narrative gust sweeps you centuries away to someone new. The constant upheaval is thematically resonant but emotionally limiting. These lives feel like sketches, haunting and evocative, but ultimately fleeting. You admire them; you rarely ache for them.

This isn’t a story about people. It’s a story about Place. About Time. About the relentless, indifferent force of nature that watches us come and go. And on that level, it’s a monumental achievement. It’s intellectually fierce, structurally daring, and written with a savage, poetic grace that will leave you in awe of Hall’s skill. If you read ‘North Woods’, you will feel at home here.

But it’s also a book that keeps you at arm's length, admiring its storm from behind glass. It’s all head and atmosphere, with a heart that beats just a little too faintly to hear over the gale.

A brilliant, flawed, and unforgettable force of a novel. I admired it deeply. I just wish I’d felt a little more.

4 stars for the sheer audacity of the vision and the blistering beauty of the prose. A must-read for literary adventurers, even if you leave feeling slightly windswept and alone.

[Caroline Barnett · Rating 4 out of 5]

I highly recommend taking a wild ride with this novel about the UK’s only named wind- the Helm - a fierce and blustery north easterly which blows down Cross Fell in Cumbria. It’s about the wind itself which is actually a character in the book and various people through the millennia who have become fascinated with it - a Neolithic woman who tries to placate it, a medieval wizard priest who tries to banish it, a Victorian engineer who tries to harness its powers, most touchingly for me a farmer’s daughter who is in love with it and a present day scientist who fears that climate change and pollution will bring an end to it.

Helm is mischievous, has a sense of humour and enjoys observing us humans:
“Human-fucking beings. They are so fun and terribly worrying. When they cooperate, they can learn, improve, create extremely nice things. At worst, they’re ruinous, dumb as mud, making mistakes over and over again. Lives as fast as fireworks too. Crackle, fizz, pop, extinguished. Curious model”.

This feels to me the book that Sarah Hall was destined to write. Born and raised in an old Westmorland cottage above a river surrounded by mountains and moorland, in a piece she wrote for the Guardian she said: “I wasn’t raised by wolves, but I did grow up raking around outside, overnighting on the moors, swimming in fell pools and interacting with, probably, more animals than humans.” Her affinity for Cumbria, its landscape, the local dialect and folklore burns brightly in this novel and her urgent, rhythmic prose has never served its stories better.

Other reviewers have rightly drawn parallels between this book and the Overstory, North Woods and Cuddy, but for me the book it most brought to mind is the Catalan writer Irene Sola’s elemental and brilliant When I Sing Mountains Dance in which the story is told from multiple perspectives, including that of a mountain, a dog, the clouds and even a mushroom.

I know some readers have been put off by the element of magic realism in Helm, but for me the chapters written from Helm’s perspective are the strongest in the book. Also, even if magic realism isn’t your thing, I wouldn’t let this deter you from reading the book, as these chapters aren’t a huge part of the narrative.

This is a really challenging read and Sarah Hall hasn’t made it easy for herself or the reader in the way in which she has structured the book as it goes back and forwards through time, but it’s a journey I was very glad to go on with her and I am surprised not to see this on the Booker longlist.

[Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helm doesn’t know when Helm was born. Or brewed. Conjured or conceived. First formed above the highest mountain. First blown into the valley. Long before humankind – that brief, busy interlude. Time happens all at once for Helm, more or less, relative to longevity. A blink of the eye, universally. (Warning: Helm loves clichés, typical for English weather.) Something of a disorder, some would say. Of what fantastical, phenomenal and calculable things Helm is made! Maleficence and data and lore. Atmospheric principles and folktales, spirit and substance, opposites and inversions. So many identities and personalities; it makes Helm’s heads spin.

 
The Overstory meets Cuddy (with shades of David Mitchell) in an epic multi-era tale of Britain’s only named wind.
 
Sarah Hall is an extremely accomplished novelist (one Booker shortlisted, once longlisted, part of the 2013 cohort of the decennial Grant 20 Best British Young Novelists list) and perhaps even more accomplished short story writer (once winner and once shortlisted for the Edgehill Book Prize for collections and astonishingly twice winner and once shortlisted for the BBC Short Story Prize for a single story – I say astonishingly as the shortlist is judged blind from 100s of entries).
 
And both skills come to bear here – a novel but told in a series of interleaved stories which take place over thousands of years (as well as some more one-off cameos)
 
The Helm wind is described by Wikipedia as “a strong north-easterly wind [in Cumbria] which blows down the south-west slope of the Cross Feel escarpment and [may] take ts name from the helmet/cap of clour which forms above Cross Fell and [which] can predict and accompany a Helm”
 
And the Helm itself is very much a character in the novel – with its own set of chapters which were actually my favourite of the story laced as they are with humour and pathos and often (rather appropriately) sweeping across place and time – not least in a bravura opening chapter which is probably the best opening I have read of any novel this year.
 
The other main and through the novel recurring characters – the novel being told in a series of interleaving chapters mainly rotating through these characters in chronological order and with Helm observing and commenting – are:
 
NaNay – a neolithic healer/visionary from a herding tribe, one of a number of tribes that form an uneasy truce over decades to build Magsca, a stone circle at the foot of the hill down which the (to them) Halron blows, a circle which is not just used to mark the solstice but as part of an attempt to appease the capricious wind, NaNay having a vision of a magstone which will complete the circle.
 
Michael Lang – once a “Durham Cathedral scholar before becoming astrologer to jings and noblemen” and now a notorious helmet-wearing warrior priest in the service of King John and the Vatican, on a mission it seems to banish the demonic Helm wind by carrying a huge wooden cross to the top of the hill.  I have to say these chapters for me had Thyros of Myr vibes at times and were the latest convincing of the novel.
 
Thomas Bodger – a Victorian experimental meteorologist, on a mission to try and map the Helm wind and to understand and describe its mechanisms by using dyes to photograph its effects – he lodges with a distant relative and indulges in learned debates either her.
 
Dr Selima Sutra – a current day University researcher based for 10 weeks at a now rather ramshackle (and very remote) research hut next to the huge radome on Great Dun Fell.  She is investigating the prevalence of polymer microparticles in the air, but is receiving odd and threatening emails from an unknown group (her senior research partner having previously been caught up in what I think is the Climategate scandal). 
 
Other chapters include:
 
Some museum type findings which link to the stories
Some floridly overwritten correspondence from an 18th Century woman (a predecessor I think to a woman which who Bodger lodges) under effective house-arrest as her religious fanatic husband seeks to blow up the standing stones on the hill around which a group of legends have grown (and which he regards as paganic
 
Various lists (eg of Helm’s effects at different speeds, its Foreign relatives of similar phenomena, its nicknames)
 
Some chapters of Little Janni a young farmgirl who believes herself able to converse with Helm - something Helm confirms in his own chapters – but who is seen as wicked and mad by her parents and institutionalised.
 
The story of a retired and PTSD-suffering policeman who gets his peace from gliding and takes a transcendental (and for the novel almost culminating) glider metrological-observatory trip into the veary heart of the Helm – the experience for him literally and for us in literal terms uplifting.
 
Some meterological diagrams and formulae explaining the basis of the Helm wind – albeit something that by the novel’s end we think of as much more than simply a wind but one of the best fictional character of the year.
 
Overall, while at times the four main character arcs are a little uneven (too often I found myself rather becalmed in them and wanting to return to the breezier Helm chapters), I think this should be a strong Booker Prize contender.
 
My thanks to Faber for an ARC via NetGalley

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is unlike anything I’ve read and redefines what it means for a novel to have a sense of place.

We start by meeting Helm, the only named wind in England, who has been around for so long that it has seen many generations of humans come and go. Several of these stories are told and we see the different ways we have interacted with the environment over time. Whether that is trying to control or change or just understand it.

I really enjoyed the personality of Helm, was so distinctive and inventive while still somehow being believable for a wind. Of the humans, Selima’s arc was my favourite. The isolation of studying something most people don’t understand resonated with the remoteness of the location and her personal life really well.

As someone who lives not far away from Eden valley I also felt very at home reading about events in Shap and jokes about Todmorden!

Overall, this feels like a timeless climate novel that explores our past as well and present times and while it does think about the future it’s much more hopeful than most climate novels.

Thanks to NetGalley and Faber and Faber for the arc

[Stephanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a delight. Sarah Hall's use of language is so intelligent, fresh and unique. Several passages made me smile for hours after reading them - nothing terribly profound, just the way the author developed Helm's character (Helm is a wind, yet has an adorable personality). For example, Helm was intrigued by horses the first time he saw them in Britain, and couldn't resist inspecting them: "In the plains beneath the Pennines range there's a herd so large it's as if the wild prehistories have returned. Helm straightens their manes, lifts their tails, incites stampedes." I know publishers don't like early reviewers quoting from books, in case final edits result in changes, but I IMPLORE the editors to leave this alone. This book thrives on whimsey such as this.

I wouldn't be surprised if this book is on the long list for the Booker Prize in a week or so. It's wonderful and I'd love to see it reach the widest possible audience.

[Felicity Cann · Rating 1 out of 5]

Got an ARC from Coundon library readers group.

I tried and tried and tried with this book for three day but had to give up halfway through. It was simply too wordy with no concise flow for me. Almost like the author was trying to use every word available and just pop them in the book.

I wasn’t keen on the modern language thrown in with old style writing in the first chapters and felt it would have been better to stick with one or the other. Each chapter goes through different characters (some repeat in later chapters) and different timelines. I couldn’t get a solid grip on any of them and again this was the “too wordy” style of writing. There just didn’t seem to be a plot.

That said I am sure this will be well received by some , possibly those more educated who like a deeper dive into the English language and historical timeline. Maybe those more attuned to older texts and with an interest in this writing style.

[W.S. Luk · Rating 4 out of 5]

The full review of this novel is available on my Substack.

“Helm doesn’t know when Helm was born. Or brewed. Conjured or conceived. First formed above the highest mountain. First blown into the valley. Long before humankind—that brief, busy interlude.”

In Sarah Hall’s HELM, the titular wind pattern that lords over a Cumbrian valley—Britain’s only named wind in real life—blusters and curses and jokes. Hall interweaves how characters throughout time perceive Helm: as a god to a Neolithic priestess, the Devil to a paranoid Medieval priest, a force endangered by the climate crisis to a modern scientist.

They become a canvas for Helm’s voice, equal parts profound and profane: Hall’s narration is as likely to lyrically evoke how a gale feels like a rapturous “waterfall rushing upwards” as it is to dryly call Helm’s storms “cunted”...

[Paul Griseri · Rating 2 out of 5]

What one thinks about this book depends on whether you read the final chapter or not. Up to that point, it can be easily - and very plausibly - read as an account of how different people, at very different times in history, have projected their beliefs and expectations on to a purely meteorological phenomenon, are influenced by it, seek to explain it, and thereby potentially harness its power.

Unfortunately the author seems to have fallen into the same trap and projected a belief that the Helm wind is a thinking being. This is silly nonsense and does not add anything to the book, unless you want a wild and absurd fantasy.

Shame, because it is nicely written and has some great scenes. But ultimately, for me, it's a failure. I will, however, try another of Sarah Hall's books, so long as they're not fantasies.

[Mizuki Giffin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wayward, omniscient, airy, slightly foreboding — this book was exactly what you might expect from one told from the perspective of wind, blowing together a mosaic of stories, characters, and artefacts that span the entirety of humankind.

This book will appeal to readers who love unique, witty, memorable writing. The language in this was, in my opinion, central to the story. Setting and atmosphere were also very strong. As a reader who’s drawn to character-driven stories, I think this is where the novel lost me, as we’re introduced to a large cast of characters who we don’t spend enough substantial time with to get to know and connect with deeply. I don’t think this is a fault of the book, but instead reflects the story’s priorities.

[Adam Donagh · Rating 5 out of 5]

ARC Received through Coundon Library Book Club Coventry.

Helm hooked me from the first few pages. Sarah Hall’s writing is sharp, vivid, and almost cinematic — the ruined landscapes feel brutal but strangely beautiful at the same time. The survival side of the story feels tough and believable, never glamorized, and that made it hit harder. What really stuck with me, though, were the quieter moments of connection and humanity. They’re rare, but when they show up, they carry real weight against all the bleakness.

This isn’t a light read, but it’s one that gets under your skin and makes you think about resilience and what people carry forward when the world’s falling apart. Easily one of the most powerful novels I’ve read lately.

[Garry Nixon · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of those books I read because it looked like a contender for the Booker. Also, I once live in the Eden valley, in a village which gets a name check. The structure is obvious: a number of stories about people in the region, affected by a strong wind which afflicts the area, known as Helm, which becomes a central character. All good stories. The nipping backwards and forwards through time took a bit of unravelling, but 1/3rd into the book I got there. And but the end, it was definitely a page turner. One of the stories is about the matriarch who has a vision about Long Meg, (a stone taller than its companions, referred to as Long Meg’s Daughters now). All good stuff, with a sometimes jocular style. But I can see why it wasn’t longlisted for the Booker.

[Louise · Rating 5 out of 5]

'Helm' is one of those novels that's so phenomenally good it's difficult to know how to describe its excellence without reducing its power. Ambitious in its construct, breathtaking in its range, heartbreaking and hopeful in its message, 'Helm' had me captivated from the first page. The first sentence, in truth. Sarah Hall has somehow, by some magic, and her beautiful prose, brought a wind to life! A wind that has shaped humans and land alike through eons, a wind imbued with superstition, folklore, fear and timeless stories. Sarah Hall is basically a genius to be able to harness all this in her book. I am in awe.

[Ben Dutton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sarah Hall's latest novel, Helm, is a work about Britain's only names wind and the impact it has over centuries on people and the places it howls. Reading more like a collection of short stories connected by theme, Helm is both dazzling in it's scope but difficult to pin down. I felt blown through it's pages, carried on by Hall's majestic prose - do we expect anything less than brilliant from Hall? - and afterwards felt this a work one could easily dip in and out of and find something. There isn't much plot in the traditional sense, but there is much poetry in tone and style, and a true sense of the epic.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.

[A.K. Adler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Truly original. Written from multiple points of view, each with a unique and compelling voice, this is a multi-faceted portrait of a most unusual character. I loved Helm (in fact, I'd have enjoyed the whole book written from Helm's point of view!); the author has captured the voice of the wind. It was hard work to keep up with the interleaved storylines at times, but the effort is well-rewarded. I found the book deeply tragic, both in terms of some of the protagonist's individual stories and in terms of the environmental overview, but with an element of compassion that gave me a sense of hope.

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helm is an ambitious novel worthy of prizes.  Several distinct voices across various times throughout Cumbrian historytell of the folklaw, science and superstitions relating to the forceful Helm wind. It's a confirmation of Sarah Hall's talent that she can pull off such an ambitious conceit. Helm is equally dazzling and unsettling. This novel won't be for everyone - there's little in the way of plot and Hall ventures into some strange territories (some chapters are narrated by the wind itself) - but readers with a taste for original and gorgeously written prose will find much to enjoy.
My thanks to Faber and Netgalley for an advance review copy.

[Lesley Dickson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bloody brilliant. From the wonderful opening, Helm swept me along through time and the Eden valley via both its wonderful, irreverent, moody, empathetic self as well as those of the characters whose lives (or chapters of their lives) were intertwined with Helm. I think this one will linger with me, my mind returning to the upsetting institutionalisation of Little Janni, the warrior priest Michael and his march of attrition to attempt to exorcise Helm, and to NayNay who lived a life. Probably the most unique book I will read this year.

Thanks to Faber via NetGalley for the ARC!

[Daren Kearl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helm is a positive climate fiction novel. Like Orbital, the Booker winner by Samantha Harvey, it celebrates the natural world whilst exploring the Anthropocene age’s effects and like a companion piece to Benjamin Myers’ Cuddy, in that the story telling was a similar format and both celebrate the North.
Five time periods alternate to tell the story of human life around Cross Fell and their relationship with the wind phenomenon unique to the area.
I couldn’t single out one particular time as any stronger than the others. It was all engaging and interesting to read, with Hall’s earthy language featuring throughout.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

It might be a bit niche, but there’s something about polyphonic novels set in a tight geographical location but ranging though time that I really like. I loved Alan Moore’s Voice of The Fire, Andrew Michael Hurley’s Barrowbeck and now Sarah Hall’s Helm. It’s a really good evocation of a place and the people who inhabit it over thousands of years, culminating in a glorious soaring sequence that will live long in the memory, all told in distinct voices and some excellent prose.

[Linden · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was interested in reading this book when I saw that the author had been nominated twice for the Booker prize, but unfortunately it wasn't for me. Containing short vignettes about the British wind, Helm, from the Neolithic age, through the present, it was said to be about the relationship between people and nature, which sounded great. I am apparently an outlier--sadly, I just thought it was boring. I received an advance copy from Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review.

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is such a difficult book for me to review. On the one hand it’s a masterpiece, the writing is clever and it evokes such a strong sense of a place and its people. On the other I struggled to pick it up as it felt a slog to get through as it’s so wordy. Not my favourite Sarah Hall book sadly but I’m sure others will love it. I received a free copy of this book, a favourable review was not required and all opinions expressed here are my own.