An excellent collection of writing from Mr Myers about his life in the West Yorkshire town of Mytholmroyd and his tramping through the surrounding moorland. He writes about what he sees. But he sees more than most. He sees another dimension in the landscape. A mythical rather than physical dimension. The landscape is alive and communicates with him. Or him with it. ( )

For a lot of people landscape is something they travel through or past, barely acknowledging it in the maelstrom of modern life, unless it is something spectacular. Hathershelf Scout above the Yorkshire town of Mytholmroyd is one of those places that most would consider unremarkable. It lacks some of the photogenic qualities of the dales, has been a place where criminals and coin clippers hid in the 18th Century, has a drawn for those with suicidal thoughts was once a tip and hides a lethal secret.

However, Benjamin Myers would disagree. Not only is it his home patch of landscape, but he can walk through tangled woods that lead up onto a crag that has its own stark beauty, its brooding gritstone seeping into his psyche as he uncovers the geological and personal histories of the place that run deep into the bedrock. Entwined with the landscape that he walks every day he can, he starts to discover that the remarkable exists in the mundane and ordinary, the imperceptible daily changes that slowly build to make the seasons feel like they have arrived in a rush.

His writing is split into the four elements that make up the view he can from his window, wood, water, earth and rock and he uses these to explore all manner of other subjects as he walks with his dog, Heathcliff. Nothing escapes his gaze or thought process, he considers the invasive species alongside the natural, acknowledges the life of the animals that cross his path as much as their deaths. History is as important to him as the modern political issues of the day. He swims regularly in the wild and shockingly cold waters in the local pools and plays a part in helping in the community with the floods in 2015 when Mytholmroyd partially disappeared beneath the brown waters of the River Calder after days of rain and watches as a landslide takes a sizable chunk of the hillside away. It doesn't stop him exploring though as he snags his coat on the keep out sign as he climbs over the fence.

It is a difficult book to characterise as it encompasses so much within its pages. It is as much about the natural world and the landscape of that part of Yorkshire and Myers covers subjects as diverse as political discourse to folklore, industrial music to slugs, asbestos to ravens. Most of all it, this book is about place; that small part of our small country that he has grown to love since moving out of London. I have read two of his other books, Beastings and The Gallows Pole, just before I got to this one and I found his writing in those captivating. This is no different, his mastery of the language means that you feel you are alongside him as he looks out over the valley, or clambering up the same path behind him as the water runs down through the rock. I really liked the Field Notes at the end of each section, these are short and elemental poems as well as a small number of black and white photos that add so much to the rest of the book. If you have read Strange Labyrinth or 21st Century Yokel then this should be added to your reading list. Brilliant book and highly recommended. ( )

I love dipping into non-fiction now and again to broaden my horizons and increase my knowledge pool, so Under the Rock, encompassing a myriad subjects, sounded so unusual that I had to add it to my reading list. I usually have a much slower reading pace when I read non-fiction but the writing in Under the Rock is so poetic, mesmerising and compelling that I read it almost as quickly as I would have read a book in the fiction genre.

Funnily enough, if you ask me what the book is about, I'd be hard pushed to tell you. It's about so many things as Benjamin Myers leaves no stone unturned (no pun intended) in his writing about Yorkshire's Scout Rock. I admit, when reading the first couple of chapters, that I wasn't really sure that this book would hold my attention but stick in the word 'claggy' which is one of my favourite words and BAM! confirm attention locked in indefinitely.

I'm a huge tea drinker so I loved the many references to tea; the book is set in Yorkshire after all, which has as many lovers of tea as we have in the North East. Not to be outdone, Yorkshire have created their very own tea style beverage, the Yorkshire Espresso or Yespresso, that I think even I would find difficult to imbibe. It's made by twice brewing tea and leaving the teabag in for a couple of hours; it's drunk without milk or sugar and sounds unbelievably bitter. I'd definitely try one though!

So many parts of the book stood out for me and it's one of those books that is so varied in subject that individual readers will find different parts that resonate with them. One part that really stood out for me (and this may sound a bit odd) was a story about an old style dustbin. It takes a very talented writer indeed to turn something so ordinary and mundane into prose so beautiful and engaging that it took my breath away. I found it so memorable that I actually recounted this story to some friends who asked me what I was reading.

Written in four parts: Wood, Earth, Water and Rock it has field notes containing poems at the end of each part. I'm not usually a fan of poetry but I found myself looking forward to Benjamin Myers' field notes at the end of each section. This is another testament to the quality of Benjamin Myers' writing as I never thought I would see the day when I enjoyed reading poetry.

I also have to give a special mention to the amazing cover which looks like a piece of art and it's so eye-catching that it constantly invited me to pick up the book for just one more chapter, thereby smashing my non-fiction reading time record. With the inimitable Yorkshire spirit woven throughout, coupled with a dash of humour, Under the Rock is as mesmerising as it is informative. It is a book that is beautiful both inside and out.

I chose to read an ARC and this is my honest and unbiased opinion. ( )

‘’Let things settle. Let tress reach downwards, their curling roots grasping deep into the underworld. Let weeds wander, and life crawl and colonise and entangle.
Let the seasons set the pace. Months, not minutes.
Decades, not days.
See a century that feels like a second. Let life breathe.’’

What is the first image that comes to your mind when you think of the word ‘’moors’’? Mine is the untamed scenery of a land that stretches from horizon to horizon, of rocks and fens and a wild dark-haired girl running. Yes, my vision of the moors was born long ago, when I first read Wuthering Heights and discovered the wealth of British Literature. I imagine the crows and the ravens, abandoned abbeys, a dog howling in the night. The Hound of the Baskervilles, the works of Thomas Hardy, even the brilliant 2018 film Ghost Stories by Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman. The moors are bound to the British culture and way of life. In Under the Rock, Benjamin Myers pays a tremendously beautiful homage to the North, the nature, the legends, the danger and the mysticism and shows how we destroy the very thing that nurtures us so freely.

‘’This way ghosts were born: in wooded dells, down dark lanes of hedgerow and holloway, across clouded fields, when drank men took fright of the unblinking brilliant xanthous eyes of an ice-white barn owl in flight [...] the nocturnal call of the owl runs the length of the woods and permeates the dreams of those of us who live close by, prone under duck dawn, the night world at our window.’’

Following the musings of Ted Hughes, Myers is our guide on a journey to Scout Rock, Mytholmroyd and the land of Yorkshire, mystical, untamed, rebellious. A shudderingly beautiful introduction by Benjamin Myers paves the way for our visit to the North where we witness an exciting and poignant cycle that starts again and again. Myers leaves London behind, the metropolis that has become practically hostile to its residents, and moves to a land full of striking omens and dark signs, a land where people disappear or kill themselves. A land made of dark November nights, a land that gave birth to a masterpiece and to a character as fascinating as he is controversial. Naturally, I am referring to Wuthering Heights and Heathcliff whose ‘’mother’’, Emily Brontë, is by definition the patron goddess of the moors.

‘’The moor, [...] where strange things happen, and have done so for centuries.’’

People go missing, stories of strange occurrences, otherworldly creatures, animals, fairies, ghosts, elements of a pagan era. And in Northumberland, the spectral Roman soldiers still guard Hadrian’s Wall, the witness of a violent supremacy that left its mark on our world forever, Can we image Heathcliff wandering those forests, determined and outraged? What could have gone through Emily’s mind during his ‘’conception’’? Can the mystery of the hero’s lost years be found close to the haunting moors? No, we will never come to know. This is one more secret buried in this wild place…

‘’Now imagine man coming here.
Imagine man coming with pickaxes and chisels.
Imagine man coming with jackhammers and flak jackets.
Imagine man coming with dynamite and diggers and drills.’’

Industry is destroying a land where kings have walked, defining Britain’s past and course in History. The residents fight against the wrath of nature that punishes us for our disrespect and arrogance. Myers wisely stretches the excessively harmful presence of the Man that has violated a beautiful place. His chronicle of the floods that struck the area is powerful and frightening. What I found extremely interesting is his thoughts over a different aspect of the human presence in the North. The potential influence that nature exerts on the residents. He refers to brooding, rebellious literary figures and notorious real-life serial killers. Can a place acquire a tradition of giving birth to wild characters, even criminals?

‘’England is an idea in constant reinvention,
A concept kept fluid, an abstract Albion.
Of falling fences. Dying ideas. Arrogance,
Deceit and grave delusion. Of mud flax.’’

Wood, Earth, Water, Rock...A journey elemental, luscious, dark, seductive, misty, haunting, captivating like the moors in the twilight, like the Northern nature after the rain. I travelled to a place of unique beauty, to a land that narrates a thousand stories within these marvelous pages.This is a book which Emily Brontë would have chosen to accompany her in one of her long walks in the moors. A book that would grace Dickens’ library, a book that would inspire Arthur Conan Doyle and Thomas Hardy.

‘’Because on a night like this the moon is intoxicating. It can make a person unsteady on their legs, and the blood fizz in the ears. It creates a thirst, a hunger, an appetite. A need. The hunter’s moon is so called because it was deemed the best time for hunting parties to pursue their quarry. In towns across the land nightclub bouncers and police always find their hands particularly full on such nights.’’

Many thanks to Benjamin Myers, Alison Menzies and Elliott & Thompson for the finished copy.

My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/ ( )