4.5 out of 5 stars

The publisher provided a copy of this free of charge in return for an honest review.

Screens dominate our lives these days. A tiny beep and we are picking up these tiny miracles of modern technology and seeing why it needs our attention this time. This draw of the bright LED lights is steadily diminishing our attention span and ability to pay attention to the things that surround us.

Dawn moves at about 1000 miles an hour across the land at the equator and slows the closer you get to the poles. Knowing when the light would fade and when it would return the following day was hugely important to people. I have a thing for sunsets. If the sky looks good then I head out to a favourite spot to watch the sun disappear over the horizon. I find it a magical time.

There is something about the twilight that allows the past to slip into view more clearly, the way that this day has slipped over the horizon with its tail still visible.

James Roberts will head out to his garden in the summer at 4 am to watch the stars fade as the sun begins to rise. As the light increases, the birds begin to wake, singing to celebrate the dawn, rooks launching into the air to survive another day. He needs those few minutes in the morning or evening each day for his own internal daily reset.

The book is full of his keen observations of the world around him, whether he is searching for curlews at dusk, walking across a field as the building storm turns the sky to hammered lead. He sits in the boughs of an old yew watching the sun melt the frost away or seeing a raven and a peregrine spar. Aside from these observations, are his thoughts on his family and the challenges that he has to deal with recently and he thoughts on the bleak outlook for the wildlife of his local patch.

Stories twist and turn like memories. They sometimes shift places or bubble out of nowhere.

This is two books deftly blended into one, Firstly it is a look back at his past as he recounts how he discovered the abundance of wildlife on one of his first trips abroad and the pain he feels in not being able to see that same abundance in his home country of Wales. The second half is his reflections on his life at the time he was writing this and as his wife goes through cancer treatment. He is open and vulnerable about his feelings all the way through that I felt that I was reading his very personal diaries. Roberts has such a way with words and this is such a beautifully written book.

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