BOOK REVIEWS – Page 5

Sunday book review – Land Beneath the Waves by Nic Wilson

Mark June 1, 2025 Comments Off

The publisher’s attempt at describing this book’s genre seems pretty accurate to me, loaded as it is with words such as ‘health’, ‘self-help’, ‘illness’, ‘well-being’, ‘family’ and ‘memoir’. Would there be enough nature in here for me, I wondered. And the answer was a resounding ‘yes!’ (although one can’t easily have too much). Those drawn…

Sunday book review – Words from the Hedge by Richard Negus

Mark June 1, 2025March 28, 2026 Comments Off

I’ve been looking forward to reading this book and that feeling was justified by the pleasure it gave me. Most of the pleasure was because this is a well-written book by someone who seems to be an interesting man with whom I’d be very happy to share a few pints at some stage. He is…

Bank Holiday Monday book review – Wildly Different by Sarah Lonsdale

Mark May 26, 2025March 28, 2026 1 Comment

I wondered whether this book, written by a woman, about five women environmentalists, with praise from three women on its cover was for me but it most certainly was. I’ve read the words about two of the five women – two who lived and worked in the UK – but I may well get to…

Sunday book review – Fenland Nature by Duncan Poyser and Simon Stirrup

Mark May 25, 2025March 28, 2026 Comments Off

This is a good guide to The Fens which takes a sensible approach to its nature. It describes the history of this low-lying expanse through which the Great Ouse, Nene, Welland and Witham used to wiggle their way but now take more man-decided straighter routes on their ways to The Wash. Maybe 1% of the…

Sunday book review – Nature Needs You by Hannah Bourne-Taylor

Mark May 4, 2025March 28, 2026 4 Comments

This is a good tale about the ups and downs of being a novice, but effective, environmental campaigner. It’s almost a ‘how to’ guide and it is based on the author’s experience of campaigning to get bird bricks (used by Swifts and other species) mandated as parts of new buildings. It is a case study…

Sunday book review – The Cuckoo Calls the Year by Peter Stroh

Mark May 4, 2025March 28, 2026 Comments Off

The author is a proper botanist (see my review of a very different earlier book he co-authored) and he doesn’t live very far away from me – down the Nene Valley in a place where it is probably mostly called the ‘Neen’ whereas up here we call it the ‘Nenn’ but I have never…

Storm 2

Mark May 4, 2025March 28, 2026 5 Comments

I stopped the car in a pleasant valley in West Wales last Monday and listened to Start the Week which had a very environmental content with Robert Macfarlane plugging his new book, Is a River Alive?, lawyer Monica Feria-Tinta talking about protecting habitats and plugging her book, A Barrister for the Earth, and Patrick Galbraith…

Storm

Mark April 25, 2025March 28, 2026 3 Comments

I wrote a favourable review about this book – click here – and I now see that the book has stirred up an interesting strong response from Right to Roam – click here. It’s difficult for a reader to choose sides in a dispute like this as one rarely knows the ins and outs of…

Bank Holiday Monday book review – On Land and Water by Sheena Jolley and D.J. O’Sullivan

Mark April 21, 2025April 16, 2025 Comments Off

This book melds the poetry of the late D.J. O’Sullivan with the photographic images of Sheena Jolley – it’s a very successful and satisfying combination. O’Sullivan died in 1993 and, I have to confess, his name meant nothing to me but I learn he was a lighthouse keeper with an eye for wildlife and a…

Bank Holiday Monday book review – Clouds by Edward Graham

Mark April 21, 2025March 28, 2026 Comments Off

This book’s title makes it sound like a field guide to clouds, and to some extent it is, but, what a field guide! The illustrations are by the likes of Constable, Doré, Turner, Monet, Courbet and many others. But it really is about clouds as the author is an atmospheric scientist and former editor-in-chief of…