The Lie of the Land: Who Really Cares for the Countryside? (Hardback) - Guy Shrubsole

The Sunday Times bestselling author of The Lost Rainforests of Britain reveals how landowners wreck the countryside, and how the public can restore it

The Sunday Times bestselling author of The Lost Rainforests of Britain reveals how landowners wreck the countryside, and how the public can restore it

'Brave and brilliant' George Monbiot

'Urgent and essential ... should be required reading' Caroline Lucas

For centuries we've been sold a lie: that you need to own the land to care for it.

Just 1% of the population own half of England, and this tiny landowning elite like to present themselves as the rightful custodians of the countryside. They're even paid billions of pounds of public money to be good stewards. But what happens when they just don't care?

A small number of landowners have laid waste to some of our most treasured landscapes, leaving our forests bare, our rivers polluted, our moorlands burned, and our fenlands drained. Here Guy Shrubsole journeys all over Britain to expose the damage done to our land, and meet the communities fighting back: the river guardians, small farmers and trespassing activists restoring our lost wildlife. Full of rage and hope, this is a bold vision for our nation's wild places, and how we can treat them with the awe and attention they deserve.

It's time to demand better for nature. We can start by replacing the lie of the land with a profound truth: that any of us can care for the countryside, regardless of whether you own it.

'The unjust impositions of historic land ownership blight all our lives - here Guy shows why' Chris Packham

'Both dynamite and medicine' Amy-Jane Beer

About the Author

Guy Shrubsole is an environmental campaigner and writer. He is the author of Who Owns England?, an instant Sunday Times bestseller, and The Lost Rainforests of Britain, which won the Wainwright Prize for Writing on Conservation and was shortlisted for the Richard Jefferies Society Literary Prize. For the past decade and a half Guy has campaigned on the climate and nature crises, working for a wide range of organisations from Friends of the Earth and the Right to Roam campaign, to the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). He lives in Devon.