Peter Ashley – författare

In Cross Country photographer and author Peter Ashley unleashes his passion for Blighty. He takes us on an enlightening jaunt that encompasses many of England’s most loved regions. His love of buildings and landscape extends far beyond architecture in picturesque surroundings. By combining personal reminiscence and an ear for intriguing anecdote, he shows us with wit, and sometimes irreverent comment, just how richly varied the fabric of England is: abandoned Cornish tin mines above tide-washed caves; Norfolk boat sheds leaning on salt marches; Romney Marsh shepherd’s houses disappearing behind roadside willows; and hedges looked over in Wiltshire. Local details are found in both Essex estuaries and Cumbrian sand dunes; and long abandoned railway lines are once again pressed into service to take us around his beloved High Leicestershire. Ashley never misses the curious and neglected – be it a sheep wash in the Cotswolds or a disused petrol pump in Herefordshire. He travels deep into t eh countryside he cares about. His wry observations allow us to rediscover and delight in what many of us might previously have deemed familiar territory.

'Open this book with reverence. It is a hymn to England - the old England, the England of beach huts and Constable skies.' Clive Aslet.This beautiful book acts both as a touchstone for people’s memories and as a guide to the visually lovely places and artefacts that we can still see and enjoy today, but as far away from a traditional ‘tourist’ guide as can be imagined.There is probably no illustrated book as eclectic as this. Where else will a Hornby clockwork train be happy alongside a Tiptree jam jar, or a Romney Marsh church rub along with a set of Len Deighton book jackets? A personal natural history of fungi and flowers will segue into an essay on Typhoo tea packets; London transports of delight into unique views of English market towns.Ruined Norfolk churches, the pleasures of seaside holidays, the mysteries of landmark fir trees. All these things are written about with passion, knowledge and humour.

More from Unmitigated England is just that. Even more from the pen and camera of Peter Ashley, whose bestselling Unmitigated England prompted A. N. Wilson in his Daily Telegraph column to call it 'an absolutely stunning illustrated book'. This new volume promises more of Peter Ashley's very English passions, including breweries, paintings, children's books, canals and Christmas; with everything illustrated from the author's seemingly inexhaustive collections of photographs, watercolours and scrapbook items. And once again with an irreverent and often funny commentary that reminds us of an England that is both in the past and waiting to be discovered.

Railway Rhymes is probably the first time that the poetry of railways has been brought together into one dedicated volume. Here will certainly be found the old favourites - Philip Larkin's 'Whitsun Weddings', W.H. Auden's 'Night Mail', John Betjeman's 'Distant View of a Provincial Town', - but equally this little book is stuffed with forgotten gems like Edmund Blunden's 'Two Wars' and Patricia Beer's 'The Branch Line'. Divided up into chapters entitled Navigation, Engineering, Waiting, Travellingand Musing, Railway Rhymes is the perfect pocket companion for waiting room and train compartment alike