The countryside, country life: general interest Books

Book SynopsisExplore the National Parks with this handy pocket map.Handy little full colour map and guide of Loch Lomond National Park. Detailed mapping and visitor information to the National Park along with a selection of photographs.This small map with additional text and photographs gives a great overview of the Loch Lomond National Park, and is the perfect companion for exploring this beautiful area of Scotland.Clear, detailed mappingKey park, tourist and travel informationIdeal for planning visits to the National ParkIndex to help locate and plan your trip

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Book SynopsisThe perfect companions for exploring the National Parks.Walking guide to the Northumberland National Park, with 20 best routes chosen by the park rangers. Each walk varies in length from 2 to 10 km and can be completed in less than 4 hours.20 best routes chosen and written by National Park rangersWalks from 2 to 10kmDetailed description for each walk with highlights clearly marked on the map along with an accompanying map and photographsGeneral information about the National Park plus basic advice on walkingThis and the Northumberland National Park Pocket Map (ISBN: 9780008462703) are the perfect companions for exploring this superb walking area of the North East.Trade Review“Walking guides from Collins will have you expertly traversing the landscape like a park ranger.” – Great British Life

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Book SynopsisThe perfect companions for exploring the National Parks.Walking guide to the Broads National Park, with 20 best routes chosen by the park rangers. Each walk varies in length from 2 to 10 km and can be completed in less than 4 hours.20 best routes chosen and written by National Park rangersWalks from 2 to 10kmDetailed description for each walk with highlights clearly marked on the map along with an accompanying map and photographsGeneral information about the National Park plus basic advice on walkingThis and the Broads National Park Pocket Map (ISBN: 9780008439156) are the perfect companions for exploring this superb walking area of East Anglia.Trade Review“Walking guides from Collins will have you expertly traversing the landscape like a park ranger.” – Great British Life

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Book SynopsisThis fully updated special edition of the classic complete guide to the edible species that grow around us includes a new foreword from the author and a plate section with identification guides for all major species.Originally published in 1972, Richard Mabey's classic foraging guide has never been out of print since. Food for Free is a complete guide to help you safely identify edible species that grow around us, together with detailed field identification notes and recipes.In this stunning 50th anniversary edition, Richard Mabey's updated text is accompanied by a wealth of practical information on identifying, collecting, cooking and preparing, as well as history and folklore. Informative illustrations of key species by expert botanical artists are included in a colour plate section. Beautifully written and produced in a new, readable format, Food for Free will inspire us to be more self-sufficient and make use of the natural resources around us to enhance our lives.Trade Review‘Food for Free is a life-enhancing classic. That it is erudite and charming as well as practical and accurate is a testament to Richard Mabey’s great gift as a biographer of our natural heritage. It remains the best possible antidote to the over-processed and the pre-packaged.’ Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall ‘The forager's bible continues to inspire and enthral.’ Scottish Field ‘Still a classic’ Financial Times ‘Armed with this guide, this month you could be sampling the simple pleasures of eating a fleshy Hottentot fig straight from a Devon clifftop, making elderflower fritters gathered from the hedgerows or frying fairy-ring champignons picked off your lawn. With its charming painted illustrations, it is a book to savour in itself.’ Devon Life

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Book Synopsis''I was warned by all those who knew me that to take on a project like this was madness.''At the peak of her fast-paced career, presenter and interviewer Selina Scott bought a house in the Tramuntana hills of Mallorca. It was a dilapidated old farmhouse without even mains electricity or water, but she had fallen in love with the beauty and peace of the surroundings, and the promise of an escape from her high-pressured job and unwelcome tabloid attention.Selina begins to settle into Mediterranean life and spends time renovating the house. However, she soon realises that making the old house her home is going to be more difficult than she thought. From the unwelcome wildlife that insists on sharing her house, to dubious building work, locals both friendly and hostile, and a forest fire that threatens the whole valley, Selina''s new life is full of unexpected challenges. In this funny, elegantly written account of her Spanish years Selina tells us about tTrade ReviewShe records with a loving and observant eye * Telegraph *Charming * Sunday Express *A terrific read, beautifully written * Richard Madeley *

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Book SynopsisOne night Mark Cocker followed the roiling, deafening flock of rooks and jackdaws which regularly passed over his Norfolk home on their way to roost in the Yare valley. From the moment he watched the multitudes blossom as a mysterious dark flower above the night woods, these gloriously commonplace birds were unsheathed entirely from their ordinariness. They became for Cocker a fixation and a way of life.Cocker goes in search of them, journeying from the cavernous, deadened heartland of South England to the hills of Dumfriesshire, experiencing spectacular failures alongside magical successes and epiphanies. Step by step he uncovers the complexities of the birds'' inner lives, the unforeseen richness hidden in the raucous crow song he calls ''our landscape made audible''.Crow Country is a prose poem in a long tradition of English pastoral writing. It is also a reminder that ''Crow Country'' is not ''ours'': it is a landscape which we cohabit with thousands of otTrade ReviewLuminously beautiful and dartingly intelligent, Cocker's obsessive quest after the ancient trails of rooks across our dusk skies leads to an almost sacred space: a place where the landscape of the imagination and the lovingly, minutely observed realities of the natural world come to roost together -- Richard MabeyGuaranteed to ensure that you never look at a crow in quite the same way again * Guardian *Fabulous... Like all classic works of natural history, is is an extraordinary revelation of riches and wonders and that lie at our doorsteps, completely ignored * Independent *A splendid book...Crow Country's narrative of rookish discovery unfolds with splendid variety, incorporating scientific exposition, biography, environmental history, poetry, memoir and biography... Your heart beats faster as he describes a pack of tight-packed wigeon flushing in fear from an icy creak. You feel the shock of recognition as a barn owl meets his gaze. It's infectiously emotional. At it's most lyrical Crow Country matches the heights of that deeply eerie work of avian obsession JA Baker's The Peregrine; yet at its most scientific, it could sit alongside the best ornithological monographs... Crow Country is a significant, beautiful work * New Statesman *Exquisitely written, passionate exploration of the local and commonplace * BBC Wildlife *

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Book SynopsisThe village of Mark on the Somerset Levels is a watery wonderland, rich in wildlife: rooks and roe deer; sparrows and snowdrops; buzzards, badgers and butterflies; the iconic brown hare and the spectacular hummingbird hawk-moth. This title is both the story of a small corner of the West Country and a celebration of the natural world.Trade ReviewDelightful, soothing and informative * Daily Mail *An enchanting book, Wild Hares and Hummingbirds is a combination of celebration for what is and regret for what is passing. It is elegiac * Daily Express *An enchanting month-by-month guide to "the natural history of an English village". As richly evocative of January as of June, Moss captures the flora and the fauna of his Somerset home with a grace and charm to warm the coldest winter night * Independent *[A] charmingly produced book…readers are in the hands of an expert -- Steven Barfiel * The Lady *This engaging account…should spark interest in country-dwellers and provide a transporting read for townies. In his placid style, Moss is profoundly informative -- Christopher Hirst * Independent *

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Book SynopsisWhile growing up, the author felt like 'the village idiot with O'levels'. He left Yorkshire to work as a journalist in London, but returned when his dad called with the news that they were going to have to sell the family farm, and, in so doing, leave the home and livelihood. This book presents his personal account.

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Book SynopsisTHE SUNDAY TIMES NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER''Affectionate, evocative, illuminating. A story of survival - of a flock, a landscape and a disappearing way of life. I love this book'' Nigel Slater''Triumphant, a pastoral for the 21st century'' Helen Davies, Sunday Times, Books of the Year''The nature publishing sensation of the year, unsentimental yet luminous'' Melissa Harrison, The Times, Books of the YearSome people''s lives are entirely their own creations. James Rebanks'' isn''t. The first son of a shepherd, who was the first son of a shepherd himself, he and his family have lived and worked in and around the Lake District for generations. Their way of life is ordered by the seasons and the work they demand, and has been for hundreds of years. A Viking would understand the work they do: sending the sheep to the fells in the summer and making the hay; the autumn fairs where the flocks are replenished; the gruelling toil of winter when the sheep must be kept alive, and the light-headedness that comes with spring, as the lambs are born and the sheep get ready to return to the fells.Trade ReviewTwo pages into The Shepherd's Life, I was gripped. Twenty pages in, I was amazed. By its end, I knew I'd read an extraordinary book, at once political and beautiful - a major addition to the modern British literature of landscape, that can stand alongside Ronald Blythe's classic Akenfield as a portrait of a place and its people as seen from within -- Robert MacfarlaneA very good book -- Alan BennettAffectionate, evocative, illuminating. A story of survival - of a flock, a landscape and a disappearing way of life. I love this book -- Nigel Slater, author of Toast and The Kitchen DiariesBloody marvellous -- Helen Macdonald, author of H is for HawkA powerful - and quietly electrifying - meditation... Page by page, he builds what amounts to a 21st-century pastoral manifesto. The book is an unsentimental education, part history of farming in the Lake District, part personal memoir. And yet it still soars... Rebanks's prose is beautifully sure-footed -- Helen Davies * Sunday Times *A remarkable achievement... Utterly unsentimental, The Shepherd's Life is, nevertheless, profoundly moving... The human values that imbue The Shepherd's Life are, perhaps, ones that Britain, disillusioned and scandal weary, could do with being reminded of right now -- Melissa Harrison * Financial Times *Rebanks's enthusiasm and talent for poetic writing is infectious... [His] words create not only a gorgeous landscape painting of the Lake District and its inhabitants, human, animal, bird and fish, but also a useful social document... What is most striking about this book is its authenticity; this is the real thing -- Carol Midgley * The Times *A wonderfully detailed and candid account of a life that is both individual and typical of this role in rural society... told with perfect pitch, in prose that flows as easily as speech, cleaves hungrily to the particular, and shifts without strain between the workaday and the imaginative -- David Craig * Guardian *Absorbing, often funny, and beautifully written... a testament to the importance of maintaining a connection to the land * Observer *Captivating... A book about continuity and roots and a sense of belonging in an age that's increasingly about mobility and self-invention. Hugely compelling -- Michiko Kakutani * New York Times *Exceptional... Rebanks's way with words is akin to that of that of an expert shearer with the clippers - swift, deft, skilled - and the resulting prose is lean, vivid, tough and handsome. I loved his book. It is one to restore faith in writing and the business of publishing - a story not like any other, told from the inside by someone whose passion for his subject lights up almost every sentence -- Tom Fort * Literary Review *An unforgettable survivor's book that raises important questions, not least about education... one of the most truthful depictions of contemporary rural life that I have read -- Richard Benson * Independent *More than a tribute to a rare and doughty tribe. If hills could speak, this is surely a tale the fells would tell -- Horatio Clare * Telegraph *An enlightening, exquisitely written account... I was beguiled by this book, an eloquent love-letter to a cherished way of life -- Brian Viner * Daily Mail *May well do for sheep what Helen Macdonald did for hawks -- Stephen Moss * Guardian *Punchy, well-read and occasionally lyrical... a glorious book, alive with the author's voice, which is strong and individual, as befits a man who makes a living in this ancient but precarious way. Most striking is its honesty * Herald Scotland *Rebanks offers a fascinating account of his life in farming that is in equal parts memoir, social commentary and procedural. Even for the most committed urbanite, it's a brilliant read -- Alexander Larman * Observer *James Rebanks's unsentimental, sharply detailed memoir about his life as a shepherd gripped me from the first page -- Moira Hodgson * Wall Street Journal *A timely and important book, with flashes of beauty in its spare and honest prose -- Sadie Jones, author of The OutcastIn James Rebanks we hear a new voice from the fells. The toil and the beauty in The Shepherd's Life are utterly compelling -- Nicholas Crane, author of CoastA vivid, honest, unforgettably written account not just of one shepherd's year, but of an ancient way of life -- Lucy Dillon, author of A Hundred Pieces of MeThe Shepherd's Life is a reader's delight. No tourist wandering the iconic Lake District is Rebanks; coming from centuries of farmers he is as 'hefted' to the fells as the Herdwick sheep he keeps. He lives, breathes and works his landscape - which gives him an inside edge as sharp as shears over most of the flock of current countryside-writers. Rebanks has written a marvellous autobiography - of himself, his family, and the hills themselves. For they are indivisible -- John Lewis-Stempel, author of MeadowlandWhat came through was the stolid humility, gentle stubbornness and genuine care you need to live this life. Many books are written about a thing but this book is of a thing and is valuable for it -- Cynan Jones, author of The DigThe Shepherd's Life is that rare thing, a well-written book about the life of the land by a man who gets his living from the land. It's a paean for a peopled landscape, and a powerful counterblast to the doleful environmentalism that would empty our land of its people -- Philip Walling, author of Counting SheepBeautifully written -- Alan Cumming, actor and author of Not My Father's SonIrreverent, honest, achingly beautiful and totally authentic. Rebanks challenges us to understand what would be lost if no one remembers the seasons of a shepherd's life or the culture of sheep farming. His joy is as contagious as his writing -- Linda Lear, author of Beatrix Potter: The extraordinary life of a Victorian geniusTruly extraordinary... written with a mastery of vivid, concrete detail that makes you gasp * WI Life *A wonderful book which will surely become a Lake District classic. Powerfully written and unflinchingly honest, it provides a vivid insight into the realities of hill farming life -- Angus J L Winchester, Professor of Local & Landscape History, Lancaster UniversityA gorgeous book, unsentimental but exultant, vivid and profound, and a fierce defense of small-scale farming -- Maryn McKenna * National Geographic *A beautifully told tale suffused by a profound sense of belonging and a clear-eyed love of the land and its people. * Sunday Morning Herald *His prose is earthed and conversational; it feels as if you're leaning over a gate, listening to his ruminations. The book exudes tough passion, and a sense of belonging and love that holds you rapt to the very last line * Intelligent Life *

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Book SynopsisPete Brown is simultaneously allergic to and obsessed by apples. He has written several books on food and drink, including Man Walks into a Pub, Three Sheets to the Wind, and Hops and Glory. His discriminating palate has led him to be a judge in the Great Taste Awards and the Radio 4 Food and Farming Awards, and a frequent contributor to Radio 4's Food Programme.Trade ReviewWonderful, revelatory ... very moving -- Sheila Dillon, BBC Radio 4An absorbing love letter to the English apple tree...lyrical and joyful * The Times Literary Supplement *His ability to laugh at himself, openness to wonder and willingness to go wherever the search takes him make Brown an engaging writer and The Apple Orchard an entertaining journey * Mail on Sunday *A delightful book * Sunday Times *

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Book Synopsis''Deliciously tactile and meditative . . . to read this is to luxuriate in the land, and to connect to it and oneself'' Bernardine Evaristo What fills my lungs is wider than breath could be. It is a place and a language torn, matted and melded; flowered and chiming with bones. That breath is that place and until I get there I will not really be breathing.Spurred on by her father''s declining health and inspired by the history he once wrote of his small Devon village, Elizabeth-Jane Burnett delves through layers of memory, language and natural history to tell a powerful story of how the land shapes us and speaks to us. The Grassling is a book about roots: what it means to belong when the soil beneath our feet is constantly shifting, when the people and places that nurtured us are slipping away.Trade ReviewBurnett manages the delicate feat of maintaining our sense of reverence for the nebulous Anglo-Saxon romanticism..., but twins it with astute scientific nous which never strays into the esoteric. She does this with such joy that we cannot help but want to join in... a heartening read. * The Quietus *With a blend of poetry, memoir and a uniquely experimental, sensory style of nature writing, The Grassling celebrates the lusciousness of both land and language ... Ideas that might in a lesser writer have seemed whimsical are grounded by the rich layers of Burnett's prose. -- Clare Saxby * TLS *A poetic, lyrical tribute to the earth beneath our feet . . . Burnett is one of the freshest voices in the current crop of nature writers -- Ben Hoare * Countryfile *This astonishingly beautiful ode to the sights, sounds and smells of the countryside . . . [evokes] a richly immersive sense of the natural world and our place within it. * Country Living *

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Book Synopsis''A memorable, oddly beautiful book'' Wall Street Journal''A marvellous glimpse of the Japan that rarely peeks through the country''s public image'' Washington PostOne sunny spring morning in the 1970s, an unlikely Englishman set out on a pilgrimage that would take him across the entire length of Japan. Travelling only along small back roads, Alan Booth travelled on foot from Soya, the country''s northernmost tip, to Sata in the extreme south, traversing three islands and some 2,000 miles of rural Japan. His mission: ''to come to grips with the business of living here,'' after having spent most of his adult life in Tokyo.The Roads to Sata is a wry, witty, inimitable account of that prodigious trek, vividly revealing the reality of life in off-the-tourist-track Japan. Journeying alongside Booth, we encounter the wide variety of people who inhabit the Japanese countryside - from fishermen and soldiers, to bar hostesses and schTrade Review'Illuminating' * Economist *'A memorable, oddly beautiful book' * Wall Street Journal *'A marvellous glimpse of the Japan that rarely peeks through the country's public image' * Washington Post *Fluent in the language, well-informed and disabused, [Booth] is in the fine tradition of hard-to-please travellers like Norman Douglas, Evelyn Waugh, and V.S. Naipaul. A sharp eye and a good memory for detail...give an astonishing immediacy to his account. * The Times Literary Supplement *[Booth] achieved an extraordinary understanding of life as it is lived by ordinary Japanese....Frequently brilliant in his insights * The New York Times *'One of the classic Japan travel books of the modern age ... a vivid but witty portrayal of rural Japan in the seventies, and the quirky characters who populated it' * Japan Times *Booth vividly evokes his 2,000-mile, 128-day journey on foot from Japan's northernmost point, Cape Soya in Hokkaido, to Cape Sata in the south. As he recounts his misadventures on this epic trek, he engagingly reveals the realities of off-the-tourist-track Japan. * National Geographic *

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Book SynopsisAn exploration of the hidden history of camping in American life that connects a familiar recreational pastime to camps for functional needs and political purposes.Camping appears to be a simple proposition, a time-honored way of getting away from it all. Pack up the car and hit the road in search of a shady spot in the great outdoors. For a modest fee, reserve the basic infrastructure--a picnic table, a parking spot, and a place to build a fire. Pitch the tent and unroll the sleeping bags. Sit under the stars with friends or family and roast some marshmallows. This book reveals that, for all its appeal, the simplicity of camping is deceptive, its history and meanings far from obvious.Why do some Americans find pleasure in sleeping outside, particularly when so many others, past and present, have had to do so for reasons other than recreation? Never only a vacation choice, camping has been something people do out of dire necessity and as a tactic of political protest. Yet the dominant interpretation of camping as a modern recreational ideal has obscured the connections to these other roles. A closer look at the history of camping since the Civil War reveals a deeper significance of this American tradition and its links to core beliefs about nature and national belonging. Camping Grounds rediscovers unexpected and interwoven histories of sleeping outside. It uses extensive research to trace surprising links between veterans, tramps, John Muir, African American freedpeople, Indian communities, and early leisure campers in the nineteenth century; tin-can tourists, federal campground designers, Depression-era transients, family campers, backpacking enthusiasts, and political activists in the twentieth century; and the crisis of the unsheltered and the tent-based Occupy Movement in the twenty-first. These entwined stories show how Americans camp to claim a place in the American republic and why the outdoors is critical to how we relate to nature, the nation, and each other.Trade ReviewYoung deserves praise for creating fertile ground for historians of the environment, race, class, and gender to further complicate the narrative of camping in North America, as well as demonstrating how others can critically engage with conceptions of government responsibility and public nature. * Jessica M. DeWitt, Western History Quarterly *A rich and compelling book that follows two intersecting paths through the history of camping. The most obvious path is that of recreational camping....The second path is the history of protest camping, from Civil War veterans to Occupy protesters.... While Camping Grounds centers on the practices of camping, as recreation and protest, it situates this analysis in the broader overarching concept of 'public nature.'...[Its] concern, one with implications for the future, is that other forms of camping-such as a mode of protest or as a matter of necessity-are delegitimized, as a market-based recreational ethos crowds out the potential for camping to yield broader public goods....This concept of public nature will serve historians well as they wrestle with how we use, govern, and consume nature to reflect, shore up, and challenge hierarchies of power in the United States. * James Morton Turner, Journal of American History *Recreational camping and political camping, two voluntary but contrasting activities, and functional camping, an involuntary activity, are the three forms of American camping explored in this excellent, well-researched book. Most camping scholarship...concentrates on the first of the three forms while neglecting the other two. Young's...demonstration of the interrelatedness of and shaping interactions between the three forms makes it exceptionally revealing and valuable....Young convincingly demonstrates that camping today is complicated, contains multiple meanings, and can be both a highly popular form of leisure and the justification for an arrest by law enforcement. In addition to being a revealing analysis, Camping Grounds is an engaging narrative....I strongly recommend Camping Grounds to readers who wish to better understand how America came to include an everyday activity that is both praised and condemned, often by the same people. * Terence Young, H-Environment *This is a magnificent study of camping in the US, from the mid-19th century to 2019. Camping has had significantly different meanings at different times in US history, and Young explores three different eras. Early camping was primarily a way of sheltering while traveling, or while in a state of military transition, with emphasis on organizing people....Camping as a choice and pastime emerged later and played a role in changing views of class and race in the US....In the late 19th century, camping became an alternative to resort vacations, taking on social and economic implications. The camping equipment industry and planned campgrounds emerged. The popularity of camping in the second half of the 20th century created environmental and institutional problems, resulting in a wilderness ethic and economic opportunities....Relevant to social and environmental studies and law....Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through professionals.A varied and comprehensive overview of modern camping with ample detail and sociological perspective on the origins of camping and its roles in war, protest, consumerism, and class discrimination. * Zebulin Evelhoch, Library Journal *Young, an environmental historian, traces "camping" back to the Civil War and explores its implications for social justice and political discourse—beyond its more obvious role as a mere diversional outdoor activity. * Lela Nargi, The Sierra Club *In Camping Grounds, Phoebe Young presents the surprisingly political history of sleeping outside, in which veterans, vagrants, migrants, recreationists, protestors, bureaucrats, officials, police, and others have fought over the meaning of public nature, with profound implications for American life and the American social compact. Artfully written, creatively researched, a tour de force that will change the way you see your country. * Louis S. Warren, University of California, Davis *In this brilliant new book, Phoebe Young asks a seemingly simple question: 'What does it mean to camp and why does it matter?' The answer is strikingly complex and in its pursuit Camping Grounds offers a radically inclusive vision of America's public nature and environmental culture. * Char Miller, author of Not So Golden State: Sustainability vs. the California Dream *Phoebe Young strips the innocence from sleeping under the stars, revealing this quintessential American pastime as a precarious practice — one long bedeviled by class tensions, legal wrangling over the definition of camping, and ever-shifting claims on public nature. * Elizabeth Royte, author of Garbage Land: On the Secret Trail of Trash *My recommendation?: gather 'round the campfire with a s'more, and read this smart, engaging book. Young exposes the 'simple life' of camping as a complex set of negotiations historically about your environments, your government, your fellow citizens...and yourself. * Jenny Price, Stop Saving the Planet!: An Environmentalist Manifesto *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: Public Nature Part One: 1850s-1880s Ch. 1. Saving the Union Ch. 2. Seeing the Country Part Two: 1890s-1940s Ch. 3. Tramp Style Ch. 4. Campers' Republic Part Three: 1950s-2010s Ch. 5. The Back to Nature Crowd ch. 6. Tents and Public Statements Epilogue: "We MUST Camp" Notes Index

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Book SynopsisEthical dilemmas and decision-making are a persistent feature of the everyday operations of animal shelters and animal protection organizations. These organizations frequently face difficult decisions about how to treat the animals in their care, decisions that are made all the more difficult by limited funding, material resources, and human labor. Moreover, animal protection organizations must also determine how to act within and toward the wider social and institutional environment in which non-human animals are routinely exploited. The first section of The Ethics of Animal Shelters contains practical recommendations developed by ethicists in response to the ethical challenges identified by employees of the Montreal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. These challenges arise across the organization''s activities, including its internal structure; shelter operations; public campaigns and advocacy work; dealing with the public, animal agriculture and governmental agencies; and their work with feral animals. The second section offers philosophical analyses of the ethical challenges unique to animal shelters. Issues explored include the killing of shelter animals; shelter animals'' diets; medical decision-making procedures; adoption policies; and the role shelters might play in transforming social attitudes and norms.Table of ContentsNotes on contributors Acknowledgements Exploring the ethics of animal shelters: An introduction Part I The Ethics of Animal Shelters: Guidelines and Recommendations Valéry Giroux, Angie Pepper, Kristin Voigt, Frédéric Côté-Boudreau, Nicolas Delon, Sue Donaldson, François Jaquet, Will Kymlicka, Angela Martin and Agnes Tam Part II 1. The value of death for animals: an overview Nicolas Delon 2. Caring in Non-Ideal Conditions: Animal Rescue Organizations and Morally Justified Killing Angie Pepper 3. Decision-making under non-ideal circumstances: Establishing triage protocols for animal shelters Angela Martin 4. What If They Were Humans? Non-Ideal Theory in the Shelter François Jaquet 5. Being Popular and Being Just: How Animal Protection Organizations Can Be Both Agnes Tam and Will Kymlicka 6. Companion Animal Adoption in Shelters: How "Open" Should It Be? Valéry Giroux and Kristin Voigt 7. Transformative Animal Protection Sue Donaldson and Will Kymlicka Afterword Élise Desaulniers

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Book SynopsisThe Natural History of Selborne (1789) is written as a series of letters, which describe with wit and precision the flora and fauna White observes in his Hampshire parish. A classic of nature writing, this edition includes contemporary illustrations, a contextualizing introduction, and an appendix of readers' responses over 200 years.Trade Review'I can wholeheartedly recommend this edition ... Beautifully produced ... Secord's introduction - surely one of the chief reasons to purchase this new edition of a book never out of print - provides a nuanced and stimulating account of the origins, character, and legacies of Selborne.' * Diarmid A. Finnegan, Journal of Historical Geography *'This Oxford edition offers new insights into a work that has been hugely popular. ' * Land and Business *

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Book SynopsisThe Natural History of Selborne (1789)is written as a series of letters, which describe with wit and precision the flora and fauna White observes in his Hampshire parish. A classic of nature writing, this edition includes contemporary illustrations, a contextualizing introduction, and an appendix of readers' responses over 200 years.Trade ReviewI can wholeheartedly recommend this edition ... Beautifully produced ... Secords introduction - surely one of the chief reasons to purchase this new edition of a book never out of print - provides a nuanced and stimulating account of the origins, character, and legacies of Selborne. * Diarmid A. Finnegan, Journal of Historical Geography *Any book that delighted both Virginia Woolf and Charles Darwin is a must-read, in my opinion. But this little gem of a book is also beautifully produced and has some added useful context. * GrrlScientist, Guardian *A natural history must-read in a new edition. * New Scientist *This Oxford edition offers new insights into a work that has been hugely popular. * Land and Business *This comfortable pocket edition of the classic work ... is a delight to handle and read. This will certainly be one of my future travelling companions. * Biological Journal of the Linnean Society *

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Book SynopsisTristan Gooley is a writer, navigator and explorer. He is the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Walker's Guide to Outdoor Clues and Signs, The Natural Navigator and The Natural Explorer and he has written for publications including the Sunday Times, the New York Times, the FT and Geographical Magazine. Tristan has led expeditions in five continents, climbed mountains in Europe, Africa and Asia, sailed small boats across oceans and piloted small aircraft to Africa and the Arctic. He is the only living person to have both flown solo and sailed singlehanded across the Atlantic and is a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Navigation and the Royal Geographical Society. Tristan has appeared on TV and radio programmes in the UK and internationally. www.naturalnavigator.comTrade ReviewThis new series of The School of Life's self-help books build on the strengths of the first, tackling some of the hardest issues of our lives in a way that is genuinely informative, helpful and consoling. Here are books that prove that the term "self-help" doesn't have to be either shallow or naive -- Alain de Botton, Founder of The School of LifeThe School of Life offers radical ways to help us raid the treasure trove of human knowledge * Independent on Sunday *

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Book SynopsisConsidered a classic at the time of its publication in 1910, A Shepherd''s Life is a rare account of the lives of those who lived on and worked the land in nineteenth-century rural Britain. A masterful work of prose, W. H. Hudson focuses on the story of one man, a Wiltshire shepherd named Caleb Bawcombe, whose tales of sheep dogs, farmer''s wives, poachers and local fairs become a sublime account of a way of life that has largely disappeared from these shores.

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Book SynopsisA moving portrait of the landscape that shaped the life of Laurie Lee, the beloved author of Cider With Rosie ''Before I left the valley I thought everywhere was like this. Then I went away for 40 years and when I came back I realized that nowhere was like this.'' Laurie Lee walked out of his childhood village one summer morning to travel the world, but he was always drawn back to his beloved Slad Valley, eventually returning to make it his home. In this portrait of his Cotswold home, Laurie Lee guides us through its landscapes, and shares memories of his village youth - from his favourite pub to winter skating on the pond, the church through the seasons, local legends, learning the violin and playing jazz records in the privy on a wind-up gramophone. Filled with wry humour and a love of place, Down in the Valley is a writer''s tribute to the landscape that shaped him, and where he found peace.Trade ReviewIt is a fine thing to revisit this writer's landscape and hear his amiable voice in it again. -- Michael Caines * Times Literary Supplement *Down in the Valley is truly evocative of time and place. A beautiful illustration of how, in some way, we are all indelibly influenced by the landscape of our childhood. -- Raynor Winn, author of The Salt Path

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Book SynopsisEscape to Languedoc in this poignant and transportative true account of life in a beautifully restored house in the south of France''This love affair between an English family and a very old French house is by turns turbulent, lyrical and tragic . . . Enriched by an insatiable, ever-eager curiosity, he takes us down many a side alley, adding another dimension to the timeless story of what it is that makes France irresistible'' MICHAEL PALIN''What a wonderful book. Exquisitely written, it is by turns laugh-out-loud funny then suddenly, unexpectedly and profoundly moving... an utter joy and a treat to read from the first to last pages'' JAMES HOLLAND''He writes with genuine emotion . . . He writes beautifully about life in a French village'' DAILY MAIL________One day a Londoner and his wife went a little crazy and bought a crumbling house in deepest Languedoc. It was love at first sight.Over the years these LoTrade ReviewA timeless story of what it is that makes France irresistible -- Michael PalinHe writes with genuine emotion . . . He writes beautifully about life in a French village. The most enjoyable parts of this book are his descriptions of the French countryside * Daily Mail *Elegant, captivating, and sprinkled with self-deprecating humour. Dolby is a writer of abundant talent. -- Peter Kerr, author of Snowball OrangesWonderful. Exquisitely written, it is by turns laugh-out-loud funny then suddenly, unexpectedly and profoundly moving, wistful and touching: a homage to a place, to magical moments in time. An utter joy and a treat to read from the first to last pages * James Holland, author of Brothers in Arms *An unashamed love letter to France from someone who deeply admires the country * UK Time News *This love affair between an English family and a very old French house is by turns turbulent, lyrical and tragic. With often embattled enthusiasm Dolby describes the process of making 1 Place de l'Eglise part of the family. Enriched by an insatiable, ever-eager curiosity, he takes us down many a side alley, adding another dimension to the timeless story of what it is that makes France irresistible. -- Michael Palin

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Book SynopsisTravel is good for us. It makes us happy!Escape more, celebrate more, "weekend" more with DK travel guides and create memories that last a lifetime.Each of our books is jam-packed with gorgeous pictures, helpful maps and expert insights, making them totally comprehensive, really easy to use, and full of ideas and inspiration. And we know what we're doing we've been publishing guides for over 30 years. So forget the ordinary. Travel extraordinary.

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Book SynopsisSHORTLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE FOR NATURE WRITING''An honest look at the farming life today. Raw, earthy and inspiring'' - Cal Flyn, author of Islands of Abandonment''A beautifully written, incredibly timely book'' - Clover Stroud, author of My Wild and Sleepless NightsWhen barrister and author Sarah Langford left her city life behind she found herself unexpectedly back in the world of farming. It was not how she remembered. Instead, she saw farmers dealing with very different problems to those faced by her grandfather, considered a hero for having fed a starving nation after war. Now farmers faced accusations of ecological mismanagement by a hostile urban media whilst battling extreme weather and political upheaval. Yet as Sarah learned how to farm and grew closer to the land, she discovered a new generation on a path of regenerative change.In Rooted, Sarah weaves her own story around those who tTrade ReviewEnthralling ... An unignorable call to understand the challenges facing not only farming but the Earth itself. * Spectator *Absorbing, compassionate [and] galvanising. * Guardian *Langford writes so movingly of the countryside and its effect on her heart and her family. * TLS *More than a memoir; Langford manages to contain and convey the whole scale of the coming agricultural revolution. * Daily Telegraph *A refreshing perspective on a overwhelmingly masculine world * Financial Times *Sarah Langford's book on farming is really a book about healing. All of life and death is here: family, politics, nature, climate, history, humanity. Rooted is a beautifully written, powerful reminder of where we've gone wrong, what is at stake, and how we can change. I loved it. * Christie Watson, bestselling author of The Language of Kindness *Rooted offers us an honest look at the farming life today. It is not an easy way to make a living, but through Langford's personal story - and those of who she meets - we appreciate how it offers a connection with the land, and a firmer sense of our place in the world. Raw, earthy and inspiring. * Cal Flyn, author of Islands of Abandonment *Moving, startling, uplifting, galvanising and unsettling, this plainly beautiful book is one of those rare few that changes how you see the world around you: the shape of fields seen from a train, the vegetables in a supermarket chiller cabinet, the earth beneath your feet and falling through your fingers. * Ella Risbridger, author of Midnight Chicken and The Year of Miracles *A beautifully written, incredibly timely book addressing not just where our food comes from and why this matters so much, but also fundamental questions relating to our relationship with the land, and the definition of home. * Clover Stroud, author of My Wild and Sleepless Nights *Heartbreaking and hopeful, this story of a farming revival has never been more important. It opened my eyes and touched my soul * Esther Freud *A magical book of wonderful stories about how farmers think and the challenges they face. It demonstrates that farmers across the country are passionate about producing food and caring for the land. A triumph * Jake Fiennes, author of Land Healer *Rooted is a brave thing: a book that prods into the ever-widening gulf between the binaries we increasingly use to examine the world. As conversations about what we eat and where it comes from reach fever-pitch, Sarah Langford's clear-eyed, inquisitive and passionate plea for farmers and farming offers a vital understanding when it has never been so needed. I hope everyone reads it. * Alice Vincent, author of Rootbound *An eloquent and personal insight into the terrible human as well as environmental cost of cheap food and an inspiring account of the people working to heal our relationship with our habitat and ourselves. Urgent, necessary and moving. * Ben Rawlence, author of The Treeline *A fine book: heartfelt, honest and hopeful. Sarah has the knowledge and skill to help people better understand where their food comes from and why we should all care. * Helen Rebanks *Moving, intimate, tender and searing, this is a gem of a book with deep roots and fresh green shoots. * Tamsin Calidas, author of I Am An Island *A timely and optimistic book, ostensibly about why we need farming to produce food, but more deeply about how farming is done, or could be done. Refreshingly authentic, Rooted gives us a hopeful sense of a regenerative future * Juliet Blaxland, author of The Easternmost House and The Easternmost Sky *Evocative and resonant. These are stories that need to be told. * Andy Cato, Groove Armada and Wildfarmed *Poetically written and filled with compelling data about modern-day farming * Vogue *Where Rooted ploughs its own shining furrow in its humanity ... but also the gathered, inspirational stories of farmers trying to do better and greener. * John Lewis-Stempel *

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Book SynopsisJohn Lewis-Stempel is a farmer and 'Britain's finest living nature writer' (The Times). His books include the Sunday Times bestsellers Woodston, The Running Hare and The Wood. He is the only person to have won the Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing twice, with Meadowland and Where Poppies Blow. In 2016 he was named Magazine Columnist of the Year for his column in Country Life. He farms cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry. Traditionally.Trade ReviewMy book of the year. Meadowland is a seasonal journey of discovery, a pilgrimage that nurtures the soul and gives meaning to life; all life. Each beautifully crafted sentence provides a stepping-stone to absorb and understand the land, with the writer’s lyrical voice acting as guide and trusty staff as well as illuminating the mind’s eye with wonderful imagery and perceptive literary devices. -- Stuart Winter * Sunday Express *Fascinating ... Books have been written about entire countries that contain a less interesting cast of characters than Lewis-Stempel's account of one field on the edge of Wales. Foxes, red kites and voles become as intricately shaded as characters in an HBO drama, the readers' sympathies swinging between them and their adversaries. Not every English meadow contains such a vast variety of wildlife as Lewis-Stempel's, and he's lucky to live somewhere so unspoilt, but his immense, patient powers of observation – along with a flair for the anthropomorphic – mean he is able to offer a portrait of animal life that's rare in its colour and drama.Lewis-Stempel's eye for detail and the poetic imagery of sentences such as "Behind me the river shouts with the abandon of a football crowd" or "Someone has stirred the clouds into milk pudding" are reminiscent of the late, brilliant Roger Deakin...There is barely a creature in Meadowland that I didn't learn at least one interesting new fact about (the occasional tendency of badgers to hold funerals for one another is a particular favourite). -- Tom Cox * Observer *Engaging, closely-observed and beautiful ... this author’s deep love of the world around him is as inspiring as it is entertaining. This wonderful book ... is most of all, a moving hymn of gratitude from a man so rooted, so full of joy that he likens his land to a cathedral and knows that: ‘To stand alone in a field in England and listen to the morning chorus of the birds is to remember why life is precious'. -- Bel Mooney * Daily Mail *[JLS] has a sharp eye, a fluent pen and that omnivorous, innocently English curiosity about wild creatures... There are lyrical moments aplenty but this is not the cloying 'regardez-moi maman' nature writing. JLS's tone is level, involved, humorous and even self-deprecating... This is a rich, interesting book, generously studded with raisins of curious information. * The Times *My holiday reading: [John Lewis-Stempel] knows not only all about the different kinds of life in such a place and how they all fit together, but can also write so vividly. -- Philip Pullman * The Guardian *

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Book SynopsisOne day in late summer, Michael Wright gave up his comfortable South London existence and, with only his long-suffering cat for company, set out to begin a new life. His destination was 'La Folie', a dilapidated 15th century farmhouse in need of love and renovation in the heart of rural France.Trade ReviewWhat elevates this book... is Wright's gentle humour and his ability to create a vivid impression of his literal and emotional journey... with such wit and perception * SUNDAY TELEGRAPH *Hilarious and evocative... Michael Wright's book provides the most startlingly honest answer to the question of "can you live your dreams or do they inevitably turn into nightmares?" -- Dr RAJ PERSAUDWright captures the fun of the countryside perfectly * THE SUNDAY TIMES *

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Book SynopsisA wonderful meditation on the English landscape in wet weather by the acclaimed novelist and nature writer, Melissa Harrison.Whenever rain falls, our countryside changes. Fields, farms, hills and hedgerows appear altered, the wildlife behaves differently, and over time the terrain itself is transformed.In Rain, Melissa Harrison explores our relationship with the weather as she follows the course of four rain showers, in four seasons, across Wicken Fen, Shropshire, the Darent Valley and Dartmoor. Blending these expeditions with reading, research, memory and imagination, she reveals how rain is not just an essential element of the world around us, but a key part of our own identity too.

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Book SynopsisA delightful journey through the glamorous story of the English country house party by the bestselling historian.Croquet. Parlour games. Cocktails. Welcome to a glorious journey through the golden age of the country house party and you are invited. Our host, celebrated historian Adrian Tinniswood, traces the evolution of this quintessentially British pastime from debauched royal tours to the flamboyant excess of the Bright Young Things. With cameos by the Jazz Age industrialist, the bibulous earl and the off-duty politician whether in moated manor houses or ornate Palladian villas Tinniswood gives a vivid insight into weekending etiquette and reveals the hidden lives of celebrity guests, from Nancy Astor to Winston Churchill, in all their drinking, feasting, gambling and fornicating. The result is a deliciously entertaining, star-studded, yet surprising

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Book SynopsisSmall farms once occupied the heights that Elder calls home, but now only a few cellar holes and tumbled stone walls remain among the dense stands of maple, beech, and hemlocks on these Vermont hills. This book is a journey into these verdant reaches where in the last century humans tried their hand and where bear and moose now find shelter.Trade ReviewStarting with a few lines of Frost's poem on the human and natural histories of this enclave, each chapter examines the exquisite detail of nearby nature in conjunction with close analysis of Frost's expansive meanings...Readers may question whether this is primarily a book of literary criticism, environmental appreciation or simply a minute vivisection of a poem, but in the end Elder persuades us of the vastly encompassing theme Frost addressed and the eventual self-discovery of being lost in this land. Elder has written a tour de force of insight and interpretive skill. * Publishers Weekly *It is deeply personal and profoundly moving--and an eloquent challenge to some of the principal assumptions that guide the environmental movement in this country. Reading the Mountains of Home may be at once one of the more accessible yet complex nature books ever published. It is accessible because Elder is an immensely gifted writer, whether he's describing the way a glacier halved a mountain 20,000 years ago or explaining why, in his opinion, Frost was one of New England's great naturalists. It is complex because the book has three distinct threads: First, there is a nature writer's scrutiny of the world; second, there is an English professor's precise discussion of literature and one long Frost poem; and, third, there is one man's self-examination at midlife...Though John Elder's book is suffused with loss...[it] is uplifting. In part, this is due to Elder's contention that man and nature are not incompatible and that wilderness may be renewable after all. But it is due also to Elder himself: It is not hard for Elder to find beauty and pleasure in the world, and this comes across on almost every page. -- Chris Bohjalian * Boston Globe Magazine *[This] is the most intelligent book about Vermont that I've read in several years. New Vermont books often fall into a very few predictable categories...John Elder's book, Reading the Mountains of Home, fits into none of those categories. It transcends them all, brilliantly, and emerges as that rare find: a new and fascinating look at this complex place we call home...A book of considerable subtlety and complexity that reads easily and spins a story as compelling as any good novel. But that's only one of [its] accomplishments. For what Elder has also done here, I believe, is the very important task of pointing a new, coherent direction for the national environmental movement, a movement now struggling with an outmoded script, and very much in need of revitalization...Perhaps the best description of Reading the Mountains of Home is to call it an exploration--a deep exploration of what a particular place can mean to a particular human being--and thereby to all of us. It's a book I hope every Vermonter will read. -- Tom Shayton * Vermont Public Radio *John Elder turned to Frost's last great poem and has written a beautiful study of its complicated narrative...More than literary criticism, Reading the Mountains of Home is an extended homage, a memoir and meditation. Elder succeeds in the most difficult of ways: As his focus expands, his concentration grows more acute...His analysis is attuned to both the language of the poem and to its concentric rings, the stories that illuminate this landscape and prove the vitality and relevance of poetry. -- Thomas Curwen * Los Angeles Times *John Elder has plumbed deeply the wisdom of the likes of Parker and Frost, examining with the skill of both a poet and a naturalist the history of the modern Vermont landscape...[He] has written a book that manages at once to blend precise nature writing, profound literary criticism, and a moving examination of his own personal world at midlife...Reading the Mountains of Home is a truly rare joy: It is a book that will not merely help a reader to navigate the world in the woods; it will also help one to understand that all too complex geography of the human soul. -- Chris Bohjalian * Free Press (Burlington) *Elder's extended essay achieves what little criticism does: it brings poetry, literally, down to earth...Part meditation, part ecological history of [the Bristol] woods, and part literary criticism, the work is also a quiet testimonial to the uses of reading--reading either a mountain or a poem...This is the opposite of most academic writing--although Elder is a professor of English and environmental studies at Middlebury College--and also averse to the critical writing of most poets today, since...[his] language avoids the lyrical and mystical steadfastly for the plain and true. As a provocative alternative to customary criticism, it is also an example well worth following by other writers--a 'directive' of its own. * Poetry Calendar *Elder hikes through the [Bristol] region as he muses on its sociology and biology and how its hardwood forests were lost to small farms, themselves now replaced by blazing maples. In an unusual and insightful book, Elder argues that not all ecological destruction this century was intrinsically wrong, while showing that, just because a landscape pleases the eye, there is nothing to say that it must be natural. -- Adrian Barnett * New Scientist [UK] *I'm not sure what impressed me more about John Elder's writing in Reading the Mountains of Home: his eloquent use of language or the ambitiousness of what he accomplishes. First, the book functions as a literary exercise...Second, it examines the complicated cycles of loss and recovery within Vermont's natural and human communities. Finally, Reading the Mountains of Home is an engaging familial narrative, as Elder processes several personal losses--the death of his father and dog, the slow recovery of his mother from surgery, and the social withdrawal of his son...This book is for the optimist as well as the amateur historian. Elder celebrates change by describing how loss soon leads to recovery; 'sometimes we must go down before we find our second chance.' Citing [Frost's] 'Directive,' Elder espouses the value of being 'lost enough to find yourself.' Delightfully, Elder's journey becomes the reader's. -- Kelly Ault * Vermont Woodlands *Reading the Mountains of Home is an exquisite literary map that orients us toward an empathetic response to wilderness. Using Robert Frost's poem, 'Directive' as his compass, John Elder charts an utterly original course as he explores the terrain of his own natural autobiography and what it means to live in place. This book is a smart, moving, and intricate path through the wildlands of Vermont. John Elder has created a beautiful, enduringly wise topography of his own, where language and landscape create a confluence of native rapport. -- Terry Tempest Williams, author of RefugeWhat a grand book this is! It's too full of life to be confined to a genre--it's memoir, natural history, and literary criticism, but it's also much more than the sum of its parts. Reading the Mountains of Home is one of the great classics of the American East. -- Bill McKibbenElder mixes his experiences on the land with wide ranging reflections. Ashe observes his external world, he also looks inward, examining how thelandscape has become meaningful to himself, his family, and his neighbors. John Elder is a fine writer, a knowledgeable and insightful guide, a livelyand engaging companion, a man of remarkable depth, sensitivity, andgentleness. What a pleasure, to share in this man's loving, thoughtfulexploration of Bristol and the surrounding mountain country. -- Richard Nelson, author of The Island WithinJohn Elder's Reading the Mountains of Home blends mountain hiking, Robert Frost, Vermont history and lore, and meditations on family into a thoughtful depiction of living with nature in the late twentieth century. Lovers of Frost's poetry, of New England's landscapes, and of the rich tradition of American nature writing, of which Elder is a leading authority, will be drawn to this engaging volume. -- David M. Robinson, Oregon State UniversityJohn Elder has interwoven a dazzling series of odysseys, of heart and head, place and people, composed them in the framework of Robert Frost's 'Directive,' and produced one of the most beautiful books of natural history I've ever read. It is seldom that the elegance of one writer's soul, mind, and style have combined to give us such insights into the relationship of people with place and with each other, and the epiphany of riding your own fragile handmade canoe through whitewater rapids. -- Ann H. ZwingerHere is a very unusual piece of nature writing. John Elder makes his way simultaneously through Robert Frost's greatest poem and through one of Vermont's wildest places. His double journey produces a whole book of illuminations. -- Noel Perrin, Dartmouth CollegeElder begins each chapter with several lines from the poem, an effective technique that creates a convergence of literary criticism and nature writing. The reader learns much about the natural history of the Vermont landscape, from prehistory to the settling and clear-cutting by Europeans to current recovery and return to wilderness. Elder is an able guide, sprinkling his text with anecdotes, statistics, and self-revelation. -- Randy Dykhuis * Library Journal *A sure sign that the Northern Forest region is in the early stages of cultural renewal is the development of a Northern Forest literature, 'a dialogue between wilderness and culture.' John Elder's...book Reading the Mountains of Home is a wonderful contribution to this dialogue...[The book] is a deep, lyrical, celebration of living very locally. Yet, its focus on such a small plot of land leads the writer and reader to ponder universal questions of living lightly on Earth. -- Jamie Sayen * Wild Earth *Table of Contents"Directive" by Robert Frost Introduction South Mountain A Wilderness of Scars Hiking by Flashlight Bristol Cliffs The Plane on South Mountain Succession Someone's Road Home Interval In the Village North Mountain North Mountain Gyres The Ledges Coltsfoot, Mourning Cloak The Stolen Goblet A Confusion of Waters Notes Selected Readings Acknowledgments Index

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Book SynopsisAuthor and long-distance runner Jen Benson decided to live in a tent for a year with her husband Sim and their children to escape the stress, pressures and mounting debt of their old lives, and this is her account of that year spent in the wilderness of Britain

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Book SynopsisAccompanied throughout by the author's evocative hand-drawn illustrations, Deeper Into the Wood is a lyrical and inspiring story; a potent reminder of nature's delicate balance and our responsibility toward its preservation.Trade Review‘A wonderfully personal evocation of the joys, hard work and meaning of creating a wood for wildlife, written with sensitivity and care. A delightful read’ Stephen Moss, author of The Robin: A Biography‘A rare treat of a book that warms as it informs and leads us deep into the character of one small pocket of England. Ruth Pavey writes with wit, passion and precious little sentimentality' Tristan Gooley, author of The Secret World of Weather‘Wonderful... how love for a small woodland and respect for its local history can enhance wildlife and enrich the human spirit’ Nick Davies, author of Cuckoo: Cheating by Nature‘Ruth Pavey spins a delicate web between the many branches of her little Somerset wood. Her closely observed changes of wildlife and the changing seasons, echo a growing awareness and concern for life on Earth itself. The author’s growth and metamorphosis into an amateur naturalist who has learnt to read the language of trees is profoundly inspirational’ Gabriel Hemery, author of The New Sylva‘Inquisitive and generous. Pavey shares the love of her wood, past and present, through a fascinating weave of its natural and cultural histories. This book is as companionable as it is interesting' Patrick Baker, author of The Unremembered Places

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Book SynopsisNestled within the heart of the county, sparsely and largely untouched by the pressures of the modern age, the Kent Downs are home to some of the most enchanting countryside in southern England. This book unravels the history of the area''s settlement and colonisation, the inspiration it has given to poets, artists and authors, and the legacy of its rich and varied natural treasures; the rare and the commonplace; the peculiar and unique, the mysterious and the haunting. Having spent most of his life living and working in the countryside of the Kent Downs, Dan Tuson offers an intimate and inspiring exploration of this unique landscape. He is a regular contributor of articles and photographs to The Orchid magazine of the Kent Downs Area of Outstanding Beauty organisation, many of which have been included within the book and illustrated with the beautiful artwork of fellow contributors to The Orchid, Angel Design. Richly illustrated with over 100 stun

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Book SynopsisDartmoor is one of the few wilderness areas remaining in the UK beautiful, mysterious and sometimes dangerous. From its rich, moss-covered ancient woodlands and rushing rivers to its sparse high moorland and bleak prison, Dartmoor has inspired artists, poets and musicians for centuries. Since prehistoric times, man has lived and worked on Dartmoor, leaving behind mysterious stone circles, monuments and the remains of ancient settlements. From tin mining and quarrying to an ice factory and gun powder mills, man has endeavoured to make a living from Dartmoor, leaving his footprint in the wilderness. This book contains a fascinating mixture of informative facts and mysterious tales. Here you will discover the wildlife, the history, the geography, the legends, the industry, the harshness and the inspiring wonder of one of England's most popular National Parks. This book illustrates why people are pulled back time and again to Dartmoor, which remains a wilderness untamed.

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Book SynopsisCountry Kitchen Cookbook takes you back to the feeling of home with traditional American recipes that will have you remembering all the great things that Mom used to make.

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Book SynopsisFrom the deserts of Death Valley in California to the vistas of Mount Desert Island in Maine—and so many parks in between and beyond—this is the only book you need to plan and commemorate your trip.Planning a vacation is time consuming and often overwhelming. And, while you’re left with lots of memories, they tend to blend together and get fuzzy in detail over time. National Parks Sticker & Logbook is here to tackle both challenges, as the one-stop resource for planning your trip and recording your adventures.Divided into nine sections of the United States, from the Northeast to the Southwest, this guided workbook makes it easy to map out your journey. In these pages, you’ll find out where you can visit parks such as:  The newest (New River Gorge) The oldest (Yellowstone) The smallest (Gateway Arch) The largest (Wrangell-St. Elias) The lowest (Death

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Book SynopsisIntroduces the reader to seashells in all their variety, explaining why they look as they do, as well as looking at the exotic and the familiar, from tropical corals and rare fossils to everyday clamshells and barnacles.

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Book SynopsisA book on writers and their relationship to the countryside by one of our greatest living critics.Trade Review'Imbued with his usual eloquence and foresight ... his criticism attains an artistic quality of its own' Financial Times. * Financial Times *'A new collection of essays by Karl Miller is a cause for jubilation' Independent. * Independent *'Wide-ranging, brilliantly erudite and eccentric' Margaret Drabble, Observer. * Observer *Table of ContentsAcknowledgements. Foreword: Andrew O'Hagan. 'Didn't they ramble', a poem by Seamus Heaney. Country Writers. From the Lone Shieling. McGahern's Hard Sayings. The Passion of Alice Laidlaw. Edward and Florence. What Happened to Seamus Heaney. Yorkshire Lad. Hot for Boswell. Cockburn's Letters. McNeillie's Dream. Glass's Life of Gray. Carnival Scotland. Lord Dacre Hammers the Scots. Epilimnion Re-Used. Gulleying About. Baltimore's Honeys. Afterword. Notes. Index.

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Book SynopsisJohn Lewis-Stempel is a farmer and 'Britain's finest living nature writer' (The Times). His books include the Sunday Times bestsellers Woodston, The Running Hare and The Wood. He is the only person to have won the Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing twice, with Meadowland and Where Poppies Blow. In 2016 he was named Magazine Columnist of the Year for his column in Country Life. He farms cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry. Traditionally.Trade ReviewA charming essay...packed with facts and literary asides...Lewis-Stempel has a wonderful way with words...he also packs the book with the singing, ringing words of others. -- Robbie Millen * The Times *Best of the year's Natural History: one of our finest nature writers with an essay length portrait of a bird that has fascinated humans for millennia. * Mail on Sunday *John Lewis-Stempel is the hottest nature writer around. -- John McEwen * Spectator *In this short, beautiful little book, the farmer and nature writer introduces us to the wisdom of owls.. every question you might ask ... is answered with economy and insight and the cultural references and quotations are as rich as you would expect from this brilliant writer. -- Bel Mooney * Daily Mail *John is one of this country's greatest nature writers...this is a unique look at the Owl's of Britain in both word and verse...some incredible facts... a wonderful little book for anyone who wants to know a little more of some of our most secret of birds and ones that should be celebrated. * The Last Word *

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Book SynopsisAS FEATURED ON ''BBC RADIO 4 ''GOOD READS''.Woodlands Awards 2019: Woodland Books of the Year''The oak is the wooden tie between heaven and earth. It is the lynch pin of the British landscape.'' The oak is our most beloved and most common tree. It has roots that stretch back to all the old European cultures but Britain has more ancient oaks than all the other European countries put together. More than half the ancient oaks in the world are in Britain. Many of our ancestors - the Angles, the Saxons, the Norse - came to the British Isles in longships made of oak. For centuries the oak touched every part of a Briton''s life - from cradle to coffin It was oak that made the ''wooden walls'' of Nelson''s navy, and the navy that allowed Britain to rule the world. Even in the digital Apple age, the real oak has resonance - the word speaks of fortitude, antiquity, pastoralism.The Glorious Life of the Oak explores our long relationshTrade ReviewA beautiful object and a very British story written with real lyricism - some of the finest sentences I've read. -- Neil Oliver * BBC Radio 4: A Good Read *Lewis-Stempel is one of the best of the new generation of nature writers, an oak himself in that particular corner of the literary forest. As a working farmer, from a long line of Herefordshire farmers, he has daily exposure to his source material. In books such as Meadowland, The Running Hare and, most recently, The Wood, he has distilled his knowledge and his enthusiasm into a style that is as rich and earthy as its subject. * Spectator *Our greatest nature writer * Books Are My Bag *A lively little book * Daily Mail *

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