Category: Book review

We all need hope, and one of the ways of finding it is to realise that many  apparently hopeless environmental problems have been sorted out by human ingenuity and determination. That’s what this book does with five detailed examples: smog, ozone depletion, pesticides, lead and those greenhouse gases called HFCs. And the last chapter makes…

Do not be fooled by the jokey title, shortish length and smallish pages, this is not a lightweight book – it is a very solid one. By the time I had read the four-page Introduction I was hooked and a gross of pages later I had become engrossed. This is a very, very good book….

  This is a stimulating book which takes an independent view of Scotland’s Highland landscape. The author challenges the current orthodoxy (is it?) that most of the Highlands was not so long ago wooded and that restoring woodland cover, the great Forest of Caledon, should be an aim of rewilding and nature conservation. No matter…

This book has little to do with wildlife and its conservation, just like two of its characters, Therese Coffey and her bestie, Liz Truss. However, unlike the late unlamented Secretaries of State for the Environment, Henry Morris, is a friend of wildlife and a friend of mine so I’ll happily plug his latest excellent book…

  I sometimes wonder how many Guardian journalists have been for a walk in the countryside (without ear pods) in the last week. I guess the Guardian’s ignorant aloofness is better than the Telegraph’s ignorant familiarity although it’s a close run thing. At least the Guardian has a daily, tiny but valuable, account of some…