With a naturalist's eye and a poet's instinct, acclaimed nature writer Jim Crumley traces the place of our first and most famous National Park in the evolution of global conservation and pleads the case for a far-reaching reappraisal of its wildness.

Books of the Year, Mark Avery

The Lake District is one of England's busiest national parks. Many people believe that wildness is long gone from the fells, lakes, tarns and becks, yet, within its boundaries, Jim Crumley sets out to prove them wrong-to find "a new way of seeing and writing about this most seen and written about of landscapes."

With a naturalist's eye and a poet's instinct, he is drawn to Lakeland's turned-aside places where nature still thrives, from low-lying shores to a high mountain oakwood that is not even on the map. Through backwaters and backwoods, Crumley traces this captivating land's place in the evolution of global conservation and pleads the case for a far-reaching reappraisal of all of Lakeland's wildness.