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The Butterfly Season

On Beginnings, Endings, and the Life in Between
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The Butterfly Season

By: Lea Korsgaard, Sherilyn Nicolette Hellberg - translator
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Summary

The phenomenal Danish bestseller: a transporting, inspirational story of home, of endings, rebirth and new beginnings

In the darkness of winter on the first day of the year, a woman in Denmark is making a list. She plans to set out and see all of the country's butterfly species in a single summer. She knows nothing about butterflies. She doesn’t even know why she wants to see them. She just knows that something is calling her. The pull is irresistible.

The Butterfly Season tells the story of what happened next. We follow Lea Korsgaard as her list takes her to landscapes she never knew existed, shaped by the wind and by the sea. She discovers secret places and meets strangers who help along the way. And she is led into the past: into the lives of her ancestors and the worlds of philosophy and myth. Because ever since ancient times, the butterfly has symbolized humanity’s hope of rebirth—and confronted us with the biggest questions of existence: why do we live? And what are we living for?

© Lea Korsgaard 2026 (P) Penguin Audio 2026

 Animals Biological Sciences Customs & Traditions Ecosystems & Habitats Europe Nature & Ecology Outdoors & Nature Philosophy Science Social Sciences
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Critic Reviews

An important and wonderful book about the hunt for Denmark’s 64 different butterflies … Read these 314 pages and your view of the world will never be the same
One of those books that makes the world richer (Kristeligt Dagblad)
Detailed, sensory, precise ... Korsgaard has a childlike enthusiasm, and it is contagious. When she describes her hunt for butterflies, it’s almost like reading a crime novel (it’s strangely exciting to see if she finds them!). But it’s also like reading a love story (it’s strangely moving when she does!)
Lea Korsgaard’s tantalizing butterfly annals turn disciplined insect hunting into a meditation on existence … The Butterfly Season is illustrated throughout with the author’s own fine butterfly drawings ... It is an excellent and extremely well-composed book ... first-class literary journalism
The Butterfly Season is a book about chasing butterflies, but it’s just as much a book about the meaning of life ... Lea Korsgaard re-enchants the world
Lea Korsgaard’s account of her inner and outer journeys becomes one of those books that makes the world a little bigger. Even when it’s about the smallest of things
The book manages to combine nature writing, personal development, and existential reflection in a way that speaks to both the head and the heart. It invites the reader to see the world—and the butterflies in it—with renewed awareness and wonder
The Butterfly Season is an inspiring love letter to the magic of the natural world, in all its beauty and complexity and joy—an intimate encounter with the mysteries of nature and of life, and an unforgettable reminder that wonder reawakens the heart (Amy Tan)
The Butterfly Season is a marvel. In this luminous memoir, Lea Korsgaard sets out on a year-long quest to glimpse every butterfly native to Denmark. What unfolds is far more than a naturalist’s tally. In her pilgrimage through the Danish landscape—and through centuries of natural science, philosophy, and religion—Korsgaard reveals how even the most delicate creature can illuminate our deepest human longings. This is a book about attention, about wonder, and about that most fragile yet persistent human instinct: hope. After reading it, you may find yourself looking more closely at the world—and believing, once again, in its small miracles (Suleika Jaouad)
Part Quixotic quest, part scientific exploration, part intimate memoir, The Butterfly Season invites us to look closer—at butterflies, at the natural world, at the very fragile wonder of being alive—and reminds us that the simple act of slowing down and paying attention may be, simply put, life’s most important lesson. A beautifully written, tender, joy-filled knockout (Isaac Fitzgerald)
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