Edgelands, by Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts

Edgelands:

is enticingly subtitled: Journeys into England’s True Wilderness and is an exploration of the in-between places on the edge of our towns.

The book is arranged into chapters, each with a punchy one-word title:

Cars, Dens, Containers, Retail, Pallets, Sewage, etc.

On Walking, by Phil Smith

This is one of those books you either love or hate.

It’s full title, On Walking:…and Stalking Sebald implies you will be following Phil Smith as he follows in the footsteps of the German author, W.G. Sebald, on a walking tour in Suffolk.

But the book is much more than a travelogue of the author’s trip. It incorporates a mix of poetry, philosophy, and reflections on walking. It is an entertaining, frustrating and challenging read. And is illustrated with photographs that both illuminate and mirror the scatological (in the urban-dictionary sense) nature of the writing.

Moonwalking with Einstein, by Joshua Foer

Moonwalking with Einstein: the art and science of remembering everything

Joshua Foer opens the book with a teaser. He is a young journalist attending the USA Memory Championship in 2006. But he is not there as a journalist, he is there as a contestant.

China since 1949, by Linda Benson

The Chinese regard their country as the centre of the Universe and the only truly civilised place to live.

But to us in the West, China is a strange place. An alien world.

Recently I wrote a novel set in 7th Century China, during the Tang Dynasty. In preparation, I began reading every book I could find in my local library with ‘China’ in the title.