A history of the military use of the landscape and the rise of military environmentalism through the twentieth century.

‘I would give this book ten stars if I could. I read it within two days and just could not put it down... A real page turner... Heart-wrenching and just fabulous. I can usually guess the ending of most books, but not this one’ Goodreads review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

It was extinction that made Tyneham famous. The fields of the village on the Dorset coast were ideal tank country and when Churchill evacuated it, he vowed that the people could return after the war. Attlee broke the promise and Tyneham became a symbol of unrewarded patriotic sacrifice, or a rural English idyll destroyed by the state.

Preparation for warfare materially reshapes rural landscapes and environments. This is a comparative history and geography of militarized landscapes.

A rock musician is missing, and a bungled company fraud has not been fully investigated, although the crimes are linked. The CEO may have committed both crimes. He was sacked but not charged. He is constantly threatened by people who could lose their jobs. After her success in the case known as Cosimo's Room and others, DI Laura Baxter expects to be promoted. She takes over both new cases but feels weakened by the mistrust between colleagues, and frightened as never before of influential people who are hiding the truth. Her lover stops coming, worried by allegations of police corruption.Matt Hoyle was hired to investigate fraud and theft in the company. Laura is suspicious of Hoyle's movements after the CEO's mother is found dead. The village of Ransoms frightens her. Which gate leads to the truth? Who is trying to kill them? Laura and Matt piece together evidence of the musician's disappearance in the village, where there is a link to possible drug trafficking by the company and the fraud. The murdered woman's husband is not demented as claimed, and the unlikely becomes the probable in Laura's mind when a complex modern painting shows the gate used by thieves and the murderer.

Sophy Hadlow does not want to return for another London Season. Her own debut into Society was marred by self-consciousness and her cringing embarrassment every time she was announced as 'The Lady Sophronia Hadlow'. Yet, much to her dismay, Sophy is back in London to oversee the debut of her younger sister and their wild cousin, Susan Tyneham, who risks ruining both her own and her innocent cousin's chances of marriage. Sophy, a most reluctant chaperone, is left to guide her sister and attempt to keep Susan from complete disaster, all whilst dealing with her own unexpected feelings for the disarming Lord Rothley.