One of the joys of reading is that there is always more to be discovered. Earlier this week my mum messaged me to ask if I had ever heard of Alfred Wainwright, and if not, that I would probably like his work. She’d heard him mentioned in a TV show she was watching and sent me a link to his Wikipedia entry without further context.

I had never heard of Wainwright, which seems odd given my recurrent interest in nature writing. Wainwright, as I soon discovered, is well known for having written a long list of guides to the Lake District. Perhaps that’s why I didn’t previously know of him. I’ve never been to the Lake District (although, now having read The Eastern Fells, I do want to go there) and as I discovered when I started reading one of his first books, it is not nature writing in the traditional sense.