Matthew Engel is a journalist and author. He has written for the Guardian and Financial Times, among other publications, and was the editor of the Wisden Cricketers' Almanack for twelve years. His books include Eleven Minutes Late: A Train Journey to the Soul of Britain and Extracts from the Red Notebooks.

Wry, rueful, funny, packed with knowledge, and, like all good reporting, entirely personal and subjective, it is simply the most enjoyable commentary on today's England that could be imagined. Sunday Times The book is a triumph and deserves an audience far beyond those infatuated with the clickety-clack of steel wheels Independent ... quirky three year quest for the essence of England. If you could bottle his wit, it would taste as sharp, rich and savoury as Worcestershire sauce on a Cornish pasty stuffed to bursting. -- Ian Finlayson Times Highly personal and very funny London Review of Books [Engel] has managed to do the seemingly impossible and find a new way to write about England... The great pleasure in the book - for Engel as much as the reader - is in his love of the entertaining factual nugget -- Michael Prodger Financial Times Engel has the perfect light, humorous touch for the task. New Statesman Immensely enjoyable... Engel is a wonderfully wry comic writer. -- Ian Samson The Guardian

Matthew Engel is a journalist and author. He has written for the Guardian and Financial Times, among other publications, and was the editor of the Wisden Cricketers' Almanack for twelve years. His books include Eleven Minutes Late: A Train Journey to the Soul of Britain and Extracts from the Red Notebooks.

Wry, rueful, funny, packed with knowledge, and, like all good reporting, entirely personal and subjective, it is simply the most enjoyable commentary on today's England that could be imagined. Sunday Times The book is a triumph and deserves an audience far beyond those infatuated with the clickety-clack of steel wheels Independent ... quirky three year quest for the essence of England. If you could bottle his wit, it would taste as sharp, rich and savoury as Worcestershire sauce on a Cornish pasty stuffed to bursting. -- Ian Finlayson Times Highly personal and very funny London Review of Books [Engel] has managed to do the seemingly impossible and find a new way to write about England... The great pleasure in the book - for Engel as much as the reader - is in his love of the entertaining factual nugget -- Michael Prodger Financial Times Engel has the perfect light, humorous touch for the task. New Statesman Immensely enjoyable... Engel is a wonderfully wry comic writer. -- Ian Samson The Guardian

Matthew Engel is a journalist and author. He has written for the Guardian and Financial Times, among other publications, and was the editor of the Wisden Cricketers' Almanack for twelve years. His books include Eleven Minutes Late: A Train Journey to the Soul of Britain and Extracts from the Red Notebooks.

Wry, rueful, funny, packed with knowledge, and, like all good reporting, entirely personal and subjective, it is simply the most enjoyable commentary on today's England that could be imagined. Sunday Times The book is a triumph and deserves an audience far beyond those infatuated with the clickety-clack of steel wheels Independent ... quirky three year quest for the essence of England. If you could bottle his wit, it would taste as sharp, rich and savoury as Worcestershire sauce on a Cornish pasty stuffed to bursting. -- Ian Finlayson Times Highly personal and very funny London Review of Books [Engel] has managed to do the seemingly impossible and find a new way to write about England... The great pleasure in the book - for Engel as much as the reader - is in his love of the entertaining factual nugget -- Michael Prodger Financial Times Engel has the perfect light, humorous touch for the task. New Statesman Immensely enjoyable... Engel is a wonderfully wry comic writer. -- Ian Samson The Guardian