I must admit, I picked this up as a gift this season and then sheepishly messaged my sister to ask if it was inappropriate to read someone’s Christmas present before giving it to them. She kindly gave me permission. I thought it would be a great gift for her, knowing her interest in yoga, but I didn’t realize what a gift it would be to me.

The story follows Friday, a young girl trained in yoga, traveling from Tibet to India. She gets stopped along the path at a small village and is found to be carrying a very valuable and ancient book of yoga and not much else. This is regarded as suspicious and she is held in the jail until they can ascertain if the book is stolen. In the meantime, the Captain of the jail, who has a bad back, decides that if she is capable of fixing his back, perhaps she really is as versed in this tome as she claims to be.

The lessons with the Captain are where the meat of the education lies, and the progress and revelations of the characters rapidly move you deeper into the lore and history. You’re learning about the why and how of yoga, and the mental approach, at the same time as the Captain, through a dialogue of very reasonable questions that a yoga student might ask their teacher.

The characters are interesting and possess vivid voices, and the pacing and reveals keep the mind engaged. It’s also interesting how effective the book is at making you aware of your body; a number of times I read something and then became aware of those sensations and was immediately driven to shift and stretch. In that way it’s highly motivational.

As someone who is intimidated by yoga, this made me want to start in a very real way. Which, I’m pretty sure, makes it a success.