37 books like Notes from an Island

This book – a history of the act of trespass – explores our relationship with the natural world in a provocative and highly original way.

Starting with the statistic that the public are excluded from 92% of the land of England, Hayes combines history with a meditation on the implications of excluding large swathes of the population from what is, at the end of the day, their own country.

However, this is not a dry political tract but a lyrical and passionately argued text enlivened by the author’s own exploits, trespassing on land across the country and visiting everything from migrant camps in Calais to music festivals to explore the various uses and abuses of shared land. 

The book is angry and defiant, and – because it has helped spark debate – I see it as something fundamentally hopeful.

This book really is the full package – an anthology of nature writing encompassing both fiction and non-fiction and travelling across the centuries to provide a vivid and kaleidoscopic celebration of the British Isles.

The book is divided into themes (for example, Woods; Swimming and Moors, Heaths and Mountains) and is not shy of combining classics such as excerpts from W H Hudson’s A Shepherd’s Life with pieces from breakthrough writers such as On Class and the Countryside by Anita Sethi.

For me, personally, part of the joy of this was the mix of the familiar, well-loved tales (and who growing up in Britain in the ’70s and ’80s didn’t love A Kestrel for a Knave) and the newer discoveries (such as Isabella Tree’s Wilding). The book is almost as rich and diverse as British wildlife itself.

This is similar to Wild Isles – a vast celebration of nature incorporating fiction, non-fiction, and poetry – but this time with its focus on the beautiful wild North of Britain.

It’s exciting to see so many different aspects of the area brought out and the inclusion of lesser-known contemporary writers such as Katie Hale, Loren Cafferty, and Graham Mort alongside greats such as William Wordsworth and Charlotte Brontë. 

So often neglected, so often stereotyped, the North is viewed here by those that know it, through clear eyes but with understandable adoration. I particularly enjoyed the descriptions of the moors, the dark green and grey wilds inhabited by curlew, kite, and hare.

This is the place where the Brontës created their epic romances and where contemporary writers sought solace during lockdown. The land continues to be a source of inspiration and it is gratifying to see it celebrated in this… show more.

I have chosen this book because of the idea behind it.

After recovering from a blackout, author Torbjørn Ekelund was told he had developed epilepsy and would not be allowed to drive. As a consequence, Ekelund decided not to be held back by this and instead began to walk everywhere – through urban areas and countryside – looking for any path however obvious or hidden.

In the book that resulted from this new approach to life, Ekelund has not only written about his own experiences but tied them in to a wider meditation on pathways, from the physical to the metaphorical to the spiritual. 

A mix of history, philosophy and travelogue, what I liked about all this is the author’s choice to turn the trauma of an epileptic fit into an opportunity to walk, think, observe and feel more than ever.

This little book is a gem that I just read for the first time recently. It’s the kind of book I would read with a pencil nearby for there are gems here, of descriptive prowess and of wisdom. It is the story of a grandmother and her young granddaughter alone on a remote Finnish island spending the summer at their little cottage as they always do. The days are long, sleepy, and lush with swims in the sea, berry collecting, and conversations between an inquisitive seven-year-old and her grandmother. The grandmother has a way of guiding the child in and out of life’s daily progress that is soft and wry. But odd and intrusive things happen as well. The landscape begins to change. The rocky island has boundaries, the sea makes itself known. You could read this book to a seven-year-old, or read it to yourself, and when you are… show more.

A small group of scholars and educators have taken the ideas of progressive education seriously and made them available to ambitious and adventurous educators worldwide.

In his explanations of why Finland has become among the most admired systems in the world, with three editions of this “instant classic,” Sahlberg has provided an important and timely model for progressive educators worldwide.

With its stronghold, this book reminds me of the horrors of the Winter War, the heavy battles, and painful losses experienced by Finns. The price of freedom was terrible.

It also affects me very strongly, as well as the rest of us younger representatives of the next generation, who today get to live in peace in a democratic and free legal state without the dictatorship of Russia's tyranny.

I warmly recommend that all readers familiarize themselves with the book's content. This emphasized to me even more the importance of freedom. Whatever it is, it's always something worth fighting for, regardless of which country you live in.

This book is an excellent description of the harsh events of the Winter War, which still touch us today.

A war always needs at least two sides; in this case, the attacking side was the Russians and the Finns were defending their own country. The Soviet Union initially wanted to seize the buffer zone only to protect Leningrad, but the war soon expanded to occupy the whole of Finland. The Finns did not agree with the Russians at all and fought tenaciously for their independence and neutrality.

I warmly recommend that all readers familiarize themselves with the book's content, which presents the actions and traditional life values of both warring parties in a completely new light.

The story of the Winter War between Finland and Soviet Russia is a dramatic David versus Goliath encounter. When close to half a million Soviet troops poured into Finland in 1939, Stalin expected Finnish defenses to collapse or surrender. But they held firm. The Finns not only survived the initial attacks but succeeded in inflicting devastating casualties before superior Russian numbers eventually forced a peace settlement. This is a detailed and compelling guide to Finland's vital, but almost forgotten role in World War II. It reveals the untold story of determination and mastery of winter warfare that characterized Finland's fight for survival on the Easternn Front.

“Helsinki, 10:30 a.m., November 30, 1939. Soviet bombers drop from a cloud bank to unload their bombs on the capital city of Finland.

In the weeks to come the world will watch admiringly as the tiny army of a small Baltic republic wages the kind of war that inspires legends against the invading military might of the Soviet Union.”  

The Winter War between Finland and Russia flies under the radar of most general readers mainly because Finland, alone up in a cold, dark corner of Europe, got almost no help, so that its five million people had to face the mighty Red Army on its own.

It was a different kind of war, with undermanned Finnish soldiers on skis using unorthodox guerrilla tactics on in unimaginably difficult Arctic fighting conditions.

Trotter overlays a  thorough understanding of the conflict on the hard realities of the far north for a description that takes the reader… show more.