The Elements

Kat Lister is a writer and editor based in London. Beginning her career as a music journalist at the NME, she has gone on to write widely for publications including Vice, Guardian, Marie Claire, Vogue and The Feminist Times, where she was appointed Contributing Editor. In 2017, she joined the editorial team at The Pool, becoming a freelance features and news editor until its demise in 2019. Since her husband’s death in 2018, she has focused on investigating her experience of grief, writing widely circulated essays and features for The Sunday Times Magazine, Sunday Times Style and The Pool.

‘The must-read memoir. A moving, bruising and meditative memoir and love story … Beautifully written, The Elements, will strike a chord with anyone who’s been touched by grief.’

'Powerful, humane and deeply affecting, Lister's wise and truthful writing makes this essential reading for anyone touched, and utterly confused, by grief.'

'Strikingly honest'

‘A staggering book. Kat writes with such hypnotic lyricism.’

‘It knocked me for six: the honesty in it, the frankness, the detail, the research, the feeling, and such stunning writing … it’s not just about losing someone. It’s about rebuilding.’

‘The writing will make you stop to catch your breath, it’s hopeful in ways you won’t expect at all, and the smallest moments will break your heart.’

'It is lyrical. It is wise. It is physical in its longing ... Destined to become a classic. The Elements is a gift; not so much a map but a compass, to a landscape we long not to visit but many of us do.'

‘A stunning and immersive examination of grief; of making a new future; the body as a site of “wrongness” and “re-entry” after bereavement … it veers from melancholy to rage and joy.’

‘It is not just one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever read, exploring grief through the elements of the cosmos, it is the only book I’ve read that has made me feel less alone. A must read even if it’s not your own experience.’