Furthermore, if those who decide the allocations of the real and unreal are cruel, mad or colossally wrong, what then?

For younger bookworms – and nostalgic older ones too – there’s the Slightly Foxed Cubs series, in which we’ve reissued a number of classic nature and historical novels. A work of non-fiction, it was published by Atlantic Books in hardback and e-book on 2 June 2022 to wide acclaim and then released as an audiobook by W. You can unsubscribe from our list at any point by changing your preferences, or contacting us directly. Unfortunately, it veered away from that and turned into an odd sort of history of the English village and a discussion of one particular artist’s set of paintings. I almost felt that I had somehow been tricked into reading it by a “false description” given by the publisher and even those who had reviewed and blurbed it.This being said, lovely read but a bit of a long winded one, It could have been two books - The history of the house and the live of the author in my opinion. Good-humoured, unpretentious and a bit eccentric, it's more like having a well-read friend than a subscription to a literary review. As Gavin traced Stepps House through various hands and eras, he saw the picture of a past emerge that resonates powerfully with our present. All this gleaned while he tried to establish the age of his Tudor-looking property, for which there was no definitive record. He has also been interviewed about the book by Michael Portillo on Times Radio and by Georgina Godwin for Monocle 24, as well as by the BBC local radio in Hereford and Worcester, Cornwall and Gloucestershire.

Grove Press An imprint of Grove Atlantic, an American independent publisher, who publish in the UK through Atlantic Books. A wonderful meeting of memoir and landscape, both rigorous and freewheeling, expansive and intimate, rendered in dreamy prose. What I found a bit of a bore was the author (there I have said it) he seemed to drone on a bit if I am honest. Slightly Foxed brings back forgotten voices through its Slightly Foxed and Plain Foxed Editions, a series of beautifully produced little pocket hardback reissues of classic memoirs, all of them absorbing and highly individual.

Mixing history and art, memoir and landscape, A Home for All Seasons is grand in its sweep and intimate in its account of rural life. As Gavin traced Stepps House through various hands and eras, he uncovers a past steeped in history and art, memory and nature that resonates powerfully with our present.

His writing style is also top tier: the book is written in a way that is at once conversational, poetic and intellectual. As a final thought, while I was reading this the author posted a comment by a reviewer that said they weren’t able to continue reading the book due to the prevalence of references to his alternative lifestyle. Engrossingly fusing domestic history, memoir and art, Gavin Plumley’s A Home for All Seasons tells the fascinating story of a couple’s journey of discovering the full past of their ancient Herefordshire house. What starts out as a straightforward house history morphs into something else, a wide-ranging meditation on place and past, taking in climate change, rural depopulation, the Reformation and folklore .J. Marsh, Judith O'Reilly, Kelly Clayton, Kim Nash, Leah Mercer, Liz Fenwick, Louise Jensen, Louise Mumford, Malcolm Hollingdrake, Marcia Woolf, Mark Stay, Marcie Steele, Natasha Bache, Nick Jackson, Nick Quantrill, Nicky Black, Patricia Gibney, Rachel Sargeant, Rob Parker, Rob Scragg, S. We get a little of the history of Stepps House in Pembridge but then are too many "filler" sections, presumably to pad out the word count. I assumed (like other reviewers) that this would concentrate on the house and surrounding areas of Herefordshire where author Gavin Plumley lives. If I’m honest, the art history was less interesting to me than the social history aspect of the book, but it has inspired me to take more interest in historical detail and the bibliography included will be invaluable for this.

What starts out as a straightforward house history morphs into something else, a wide-ranging meditation on place and past, taking in climate change, rural depopulation, the Reformation and folklore. Gavin Plumley considered himself a distinctly urban being… until he met his rural husband, Alastair. I listened to the audible audio edition but it isn't on Goodreads yet and I can't find the asin number to add it. The author is entitled to his opinion, but I bought the book for the house not an essay on modern climate change, criticism of government officials’ handling of the pandemic, or the merits of socialism.But I have a love of art, literature, gardening, architecture and history (all represented throughout the book) and yet I still felt long portions overly tedious and at times pretentious. A hybrid work of domestic history and European art, of memoir and landscape, A Home for All Seasons is both grand in its sweep and intimate in its account of life on the edge of England. With ancient beams crossing the ceiling, the date they’d been given of 1800 seemed out by centuries. The Hogarth Press where I’m working, is in the heart of the literary world, with authors coming in all the time.