Changes

<!-- Hewitt -->{{Frontpage[[image:Hewitt_Renoir.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1785782738?ieisbn=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1785782738]]0957181167===[[Renoir's Dancer: The Secret Life of Suzanne Valadon by Catherine Hewitt]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|linktitle=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Biography|Biography]], [[:Category:Art|Art]] Deep in the rural parts of France in the 1860s, you would never really expect to find someone who would come to embody a full artistic period – Blue Skies and not just a movement at that, but a full generation of both creative and societal change. And if you were to expect that someone, they would like as not be male. But almost stumbling into the hedonistic culture of Montmartre came Marie-Clementine Valadon. She started in the circus that first caught her teenaged eye, although her gymnastic career was short-lived. But what she did have from that was the poise to be an appealing model for some seriously important painters, and a natural beauty and figure to appeal to both them and their audiences. And what she also had, much to the surprise of many and the distaste of some, was artistic talent of her own… [[Renoir's DancerBoat Trips: The Secret Life Norfolk of Suzanne Valadon by Catherine Hewitt|Full Review]]Brian Lewis<br> <!-- Murakami -->[[image:Murakami_Music.jpg|left|linkauthor=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1784700142?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1784700142]]Alan Marshall|rating===[[Absolutely on Music: Conversations with Seiji Ozawa by Haruki Murakami and Seiji Ozawa]]===5[[image:3.5star.jpg|linkgenre=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Art|Art]] Murakami loves music, any reader of his could tell you as much. Norwegian Wood was named after a Beatles song (albeit one not very well known) and After Dark is framed by a music soundtrack in a brilliant display of atmospheric setting. With this all that love is here. And like all who have a good taste in music, Murakami's is eclectic and very well considered. I found myself looking up musicians after reading this because I found many of his opinions quite convincing. [[Absolutely on Music: Conversations with Seiji Ozawa by Haruki Murakami and Seiji Ozawa|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Ravilious -->[[image:Ravilious_Recent.jpg|left|linksummary=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1908524936?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1908524936]] ===[[The Recent Past by James Ravilious]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Art|Art]] James, son of the war artist Eric Ravilious, inherited his father's artistic talents. Although he was a gifted painter, his main career was to There are few positive things which can be as said about a photographer.|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Wood -->[[image:Wood_Gothic.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1419725335?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1419725335]] ===[[American Gothic: The Life of Grant Wood by Susan Wood and Ross MacDonald]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Children's Non-Fiction|Children's Non-Fiction]]substandard apartment when you’re on holiday but this time, [[:Category:Confident Readers|Confident Readers]], [[:Category:Art|Art]] Who won a national prize for a crayon drawing of three oak leaves before he was properly in his teens? Who sought acclaim as an artist and came trying to Europe to study from the greats, only to reject all they had to offer? Who instinctively knew avoid looking at a picture of his dentist (yes, his dentist) would be problem I found myself looking more appealing and say more to people than floating water lilies and frilly ballet dancers? The answer in all cases was Grant Wood, practically the most well-known painter in America at one time, and still the best, alongside Edward Hopper, closely at presenting his world minus any Modernist trappings. [[American Gothic: The Life of Grant Wood by Susan Wood and Ross MacDonald|Full Review]]<br> <!-- V&A -->[[image:V&A_Patchwork.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0500293260?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=0500293260]] ===[[Patchwork and Quilting: A Maker's Guide by Victoria and Albert Museum]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crafts|Crafts]], [[:Category:Art|Art]] Patchwork is a magical craft: you can take relatively small pieces couple of material and turn them into another piece of material with an entirely different pattern. Quilting converts a topper and a backing fabric with some wadding in between into a fabric of an entirely different weight. Combine pictures on the two crafts and you have something more than magical, occasionally fashionable but always deeply satisfying. But where to start, when there are so many different styles of both crafts? One answer is to read ''Patchwork and Quilting: A Maker's Guide'' which looks - as the cover says walls - at styles from Italian trapunto to Korean jogakbo and then delivers fifteen projects inspired was completely taken by the V&A collections. [[Patchwork and Quilting: A Maker's Guide by Victoria and Albert Museum|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Rutherford -->[[image:Rutherford_Landscape.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1445669935?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1445669935]] ===[[Landscape Gardens by Sarah Rutherford]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Art|Art]] My first experience work of a ''big'' garden was Versailles as a teenager and whilst I was impressed, I didn't really like itBrian Lewis. I felt stifled searched online and strangely underwhelmed by the flatness could only find ‘used’ versions of it all. As luck would have it I then saw Hampton Court this book and it was official: the print I wanted was off big gardens‘not available’. It would be many years before I revised my opinion. On Oh, dear - then a trip to Harewood House it was too hot a day to be corralled into few doors down from the houseapartment, so I wandered the gardens and found they were delightful. I felt uplifted. Then a cricket match at Stowe gave me the opportunity to walk the grounds for over an hour. I was completely won over and gift shop with a devotee stack of Lancelot 'Capability' Brown. Sarah Rutherford's ''Landscape Gardens'' was an opportunity to put him in context. [[Landscape Gardens by Sarah Rutherford|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Barrie -->[[image:Barrie_Peter.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1786750856?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1786750856]] ===[[Peter Pan and Wendy by J M Barrie and Robert Ingpen]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:For Sharing|For Sharing]], [[:Category:Art|Art]] It's a childhood staple brand new books - the story of Wendy, John and Michael Darling and their beloved nurse, Nana the Newfoundland dog who took them to school each day. It's George Darling, their father, who makes the mistake when he locks Nana in the yard and the children are whisked away to Neverland by Peter Pan and Tinkerbell. There's a wonderful mix framed print of characters, from Peter Pan, the boy who never wants to grow up, Tinkerbell, the rather unpleasant fairy, Captain Hook, Tiger Lily, the lost boys and - of course - Wendy, but then it wouldn't have been a classic since the original stage production in 1904 and the novel of 1911 if it were otherwisepicture I wanted. [[Peter Pan and Wendy by J M Barrie and Robert Ingpen|Full Review]]<br>}}{{Frontpage<!-- Grahame -->[[image:Grahame_Wind.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1786751062?ieauthor=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1786751062]] ===[[The Wind in The Willows by Kenneth Grahame and Robert Ingpen]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Confident Readers|Confident Readers]]Antoine Laurain, [[:Category:Art|Art]] Kenneth Grahame's ''The Wind in the Willows'' was one of the defining books of my childhood Le Sonneur and more than sixty years after I first read the book I've just recently passed it onto another young reader. Since the book was first published in 1908 there have been some notable illustrators: Paul Bransom provided illustrations for the 1913 edition, Ernest H Shepard Jane Aitken (perhaps better known for his illustrations of ''Winnie the Pooh'') in 1933, Arthur Rackham (possibly the leading illustrator from the golden age of book illustrationtranslator) in 1940 and Robert Ingpen who illustrated the centenary edition of ''The Wind in the Willows''. [[The Wind in The Willows by Kenneth Grahame and Robert Ingpen|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Jenkins -->[[image:Jenkins_100.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/024197898X?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=024197898X]] ===[[Britain's 100 Best Railway Stations by Simon Jenkins]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|linktitle=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Reference|Reference]], [[:Category:Art|Art]], [[:Category:Travel|Travel]] In the mid twentieth century the railway was something which harked back to the Victorian age with trains being supplanted by cars and planes, but steam was being replaced by oil, even then and in the twenty-first century oil Red is giving way to electricity. It's cleaner, more environmentally friendly and the stations which we'd all rushed through as quickly as possible, keen to escape their grime, were restored and became places to be admired, possibly even lingered in. Simon Jenkins has chosen his hundred best railway stations. [[Britain's 100 Best Railway Stations by Simon Jenkins|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Hurst -->[[image:Hurst_Norfolk.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/095444003X?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=095444003X]] ===[[On My Way: Norfolk Coastal Walks by John Hurst]]===Heart [[image:5star.jpg|linkrating=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Art|Art]],[[:Category:Sport|Sport]] It was pure serendipity: after a five-hour drive we were, annoyingly, left with an hour to fill in Blakeney before we could have the keys to our holiday cottage3. There was an art exhibition in the church hall, so we went in - and found a display of the most gorgeous pictures. I'd cheerfully have bought every one and hung them on our walls, but thought that I would have to make do with a couple of greetings cards when I saw ''On My Way: Norfolk Coastal Walks'' and I couldn't resist buying it. [[On My Way: Norfolk Coastal Walks by John Hurst|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Blackburn -->5[[image:Blackburn_Threads.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0099582198?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=0099582198]] ===[[Threads: The Delicate Life of John Craske by Julia Blackburn]]==genre=Literary Fiction  [[image:4.5star.jpg|linksummary=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:BiographyAntoine Laurain|BiographyAntoine Laurain]], [[:Category:Art|Art]] John Craske was a fisherman, from a family of fishermen, who became too ill to go to sea. He was born in Sheringham on the north Norfolk coast in 1881 and would eventually die in the Norwich hospital in 1943 after a life which could books have always been defined by ill health. There were various explanations for what ailed him, what caused him to sink into a stupour, sometimes for years at a time black and white and he was on occasions described as 'an imbecile'. But John had a natural artistic talent, albeit that his work had to be done on the available surfaces read in his home. Chair seats, window sills, the backs of doors all carried his wonderful pictures of the sea. Then he moved on to embroidery, producing wonderful pictures of the Norfolk coast - and, most famously, of the evacuation at Dunkirk. [[Threads: The Delicate Life of John Craske by Julia Blackburn|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Bray -->[[image:Bray Titania.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/184365329X?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=184365329X]] ===[[Titania and Oberon by Jo Manton, Phyllis Bray and David Buckman]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Confident Readers|Confident Readers]], [[:Category:Art|Art]] ''Equus, Waiting for Godot and A Mid-summer Night's Dream'' – three very distinctive plays, and my favourite three, out of which you won't often get me choosing just onehouse. But were I to do And sowas this one, it might actually be the last, for the simple reason although I would delight in playing any and all characters from it. Yes, I know Hermia and Helena look a bit implausible now could have spelled that more accurately – but I put it to you stranger things happen on stage… Some of the strangest things involve a player himselfthis one was, a lowly actor who gets given an ass's head and is forced to be the enamoured of a fairy queen. It's this section of the play that this book concentrates on, in quite stunning form. [[Titania black and Oberon by Jo Manton, Phyllis Bray white and David Buckman|Full Review]]<br> <!-- BM-->[[image:BM_Origamired.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0857639382?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=0857639382]] ===[[OrigamiYes, Poems and Pictures by The British Museum]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crafts|Crafts]], [[:Category:Art|Art]] Sometimes you find a delight of a book. On he has an afternoon when it was unseasonably cold and decidedly wet I discovered ''Origamiartistic collaborator on this piece, Poems and Pictures'' and I was transported to Japan. As the title suggests we're looking at three celebrated arts and crafts: the ancient art of paper folding, haiku poetry and painting. I'll confess that think it was the origami which caught my attention, but I was surprised by the extent to which the rest of the book caught my imagination. We begin with something very simple: a boat and in case you're worried, all the entries have a degree of difficulty (from 'simple' through s possible to 'tricky') and this say not one is at page lacks the lowest levelinfluence of some striking visual ideas. [[Origami, Poems and Pictures by The British Museum|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Foreman -->[[image:Foreman_Travel.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1783704721?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&campisbn=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1783704721]]1913547183 ===[[Travels With My Sketchbook by Michael Foreman]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Art|Art]], [[:Category:Travel|Travel]] I guess the best children's literature can do away with complete veracity, as long as it has something about it that is recognisable – a little of the spirit, heart and character of the real thing, whatever it may be. And if that's the case then it definitely applies to children's literature illustrations, such as those provided close on two hundred times by [[:Category:Michael Foreman|Michael Foreman]]. This prolific artist leapt at a scholarship in the US when he'd completed his official, formal studies, and it would appear – huge credits list regardless – that he's never stopped moving since, as this book takes us to all corners of the world, and back home again. [[Travels With My Sketchbook by Michael Foreman|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Biesty -->[[image:Biesty Trains.jpg|left|link=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1783704241?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1783704241]] ===[[Stephen Biesty's Trains by Ian Graham and Stephen Biesty]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Art|Art]], [[:Category:Travel|Travel]], [[:Category:Children's Non-Fiction|Children's Non-Fiction]] Trains look imposing, but true fans (little boys, usually from about three years old and upwards) want to know what lies beneath the skin which you can see. They want to know how it works. Getting to grips with one in real life is quite a big ask, but the next best thing is ''Stephen Biesty's Trains'' which features trains from all over the world and spanning the early steam train (complete with cow catcher) right through to the trains of the future which can reach a speed of 430 kph and don't even run on rails. Once the train reaches a speed of 150 kph the wheels are raised and the train is held up by magnetic forces alone. [[Stephen Biesty's Trains by Ian Graham and Stephen Biesty|Full Review]]<br> <!-- Cumming -->Frontpage[[image:Cumming_Vanishing.jpg|left|linkisbn=https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0099587041?ie=UTF8&tag=thebookbag-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=0099587041]] ===[[The Vanishing Man - In Search of Velazquez by Laura Cumming]]===1912242052[[image:5star.jpg|linktitle=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Art|Art]], [[:Category:Biography|Biography]] Pitching up at an auction and picking up a lost masterpiece O Joy for a pittance is the dream for most art lovers. That seemingly happy circumstance happened to bookseller John Snare at a sale in 1845 and is the centrepiece to Laura Cumming's excellent ''The Vanishing Man – In Pursuit of Velazquez''.[[The Vanishing Man - In Search of Velazquez by Laura Cumming|Full Review]]<br> <br> <br> {{newreviewme!|author= Siri Hustvedt|title= A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women: Essays on Art, Sex and the MindKeir Davidson|rating= 43|genre= Politics and Society Art|summary= I must confess that ''A Woman LookingOh Joy for me!'' gives Coleridge credit for being '' spoke the first person to walk the mountains alone, not because he had to me on for work, as a profoundminer, quarryman, intimate level. This is in part due shepherd or pack-horse driver, but because he wanted to the apparent similarities between me for pleasure and Siri Hustvedt - we are both feminists who love art adventure. His rapturous encounters with their natural beauty, and also love science in a its literary consequences, changed our view of the world which emphasises that these two passions are mutually exclusive. What Hustvedt suggests in ''A Woman Looking'' is that it is the similarities between these two areas we should emphasise and that a cohesive, inclusive approach towards art and science could help fill the gaps in both disciplines. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473638895</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1980891117|title=G Engleheart Pinxit 1805: A year in the life of George Engleheart|author=Kate PrendergastJohn Webley|rating=4.5|genre=Art|summary=George Engleheart was one of the leading portrait miniaturists of Georgian London, with a career lasting from the 1770s to the Regency era. He was also one of the most prolific, painting nearly 5,000 miniatures altogether (over twenty of them being of King George III). Throughout most of that time he carefully recorded the names of each of his clients, and subsequently transcribed them into what is referred to as his fee book.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Hewitt_Renoir|title=Renoir's Dancer: The Secret Life of Suzanne Valadon|author=Catherine Hewitt|rating=4.5|genre=Art|summary=Deep in the rural parts of France in the 1860s, you would never really expect to find someone who would come to embody a full artistic period – and not just a movement at that, but a full generation of both creative and societal change. And if you were to expect that someone, they would like as not be male. But almost stumbling into the hedonistic culture of Montmartre came Marie-Clementine Valadon. She started in the circus that first caught her teenaged eye, although her gymnastic career was short-lived. But what she did have from that was the poise to be an appealing model for some seriously important painters and a natural beauty and figure to appeal to both them and their audiences. And what she also had, much to the surprise of many and the distaste of some, was artistic talent of her own…}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Murakami_Music|title=Dog Absolutely on Music: Conversations with Seiji Ozawa|author=Haruki Murakami and Seiji Ozawa|rating=3.5|genre=Art|summary=Murakami loves music, any reader of his could tell you as much. Norwegian Wood was named after a Beatles song (albeit one not very well known) and After Dark is framed by a music soundtrack in a brilliant display of atmospheric setting. With this, all that love is here. And like all who have a Digger: good taste in music, Murakami's is eclectic and very well considered. I found myself looking up musicians after reading this because I found many of his opinions quite convincing.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Ravilious_Recent|title=The Tricky IncidentRecent Past|author=James Ravilious

|genre=For SharingArt|summary=I'm going to tell you a story about Dog, ManJames, Lady and the Pup. They all work on an industrial site - in fact Dog and Man live there in a caravan and Man drives the sort son of digger which is dreamed about by boys large and small. Lady and the Pup run the snack bar and one day as they're all having something to eatwar artist Eric Ravilious, the Pup goes missing. Man and Lady search everywhere but itinherited his father's Dog's sharp ears which finally track him down - caught in artistic talents. Although he was a branch over a fast-flowing stream. And it's Dog who works out how gifted painter, his main career was to rescue him. I needed 88 words to tell you that story, but Kate Prendergast does it without using be as a single one - and she tells it in a far more engaging way than I could ever managephotographer.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910646148</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Will JonesWood_Gothic|title= How to Read New YorkAmerican Gothic: A Crash Course in Big Apple ArchitectureThe Life of Grant Wood|author=Susan Wood and Ross MacDonald|rating= 4.5|genre= TravelArt|summary=New York is home to some Who won a national prize for a crayon drawing of the most iconic three oak leaves before he was properly in his teens? Who sought acclaim as an artist and instantly-recognisable pieces of architecture in came to Europe to study from the world. The city is greats, only to reject all they had to offer? Who instinctively knew a mishmash picture of architectural styleshis dentist (yes, a place where Classical his dentist) would be more appealing and Colonial meet Renaissance say more to people than floating water lilies and Modernist. frilly ballet dancers? The result is a glorious fusion that works perfectly answer in all cases was Grant Wood, practically the most well-known painter in America at one time, and upon closer inspection has a plethora of secrets just waiting to be revealed. Welcome to New York.still the best, alongside Edward Hopper, at presenting his world minus any Modernist trappings..|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782404104</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=@dogsofinstagramV&A_Patchwork|title=Dogs on InstagramPatchwork and Quilting: A Maker's Guide|author=Victoria and Albert Museum|rating=34.5|genre=PetsArt|summary=IPatchwork is a magical craft: you can take relatively small pieces of material and turn them into another piece of material with an entirely different pattern. Quilting converts a topper and a backing fabric with some wadding in between into a fabric of an entirely different weight. Combine the two crafts and you have something more than magical, occasionally fashionable but always deeply satisfying. But where to start, when there are so many different styles of both crafts? One answer is to read ''Patchwork and Quilting: A Maker's Guide'' which looks - as the cover says - at styles from Italian trapunto to Korean jogakbo and then delivers fifteen projects inspired by the V&A collections.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Rutherford_Landscape|title=Landscape Gardens|author=Sarah Rutherford|rating=4|genre=Art|summary=My first experience of a ''big''m garden was Versailles as a sucker for dogs: teenager and whilst I was impressed, I candidn't walk past one in really like it. I felt stifled and strangely underwhelmed by the street without stopping flatness of it all. As luck would have it I then saw Hampton Court and having it was official: I was off big gardens. It would be many years before I revised my opinion. On a conversationtrip to Harewood House, sometimes without bothering to speak it was too hot a day to be corralled into the ownershouse, so I wandered the gardens and found they were delightful. I felt uplifted. Then a cricket match at Stowe gave me the opportunity to walk the grounds for over an hour. I was completely won over and a devotee of Lancelot 'Capability' Brown. Sarah Rutherford's ''Landscape Gardens'' was an opportunity to put him in context.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Barrie_Peter|title=Peter Pan and Wendy|author=J M Barrie and Robert Ingpen|rating=4|genre=Art|summary=It's a book childhood staple - the story of pictures Wendy, John and Michael Darling and their beloved nurse, Nana the Newfoundland dog who took them to school each day. It's George Darling, their father, who makes the mistake when he locks Nana in the yard and the children are whisked away to Neverland by Peter Pan and Tinkerbell. There's a wonderful mix of dogs was going characters, from Peter Pan, the boy who never wants to be right grow up , Tinkerbell, the rather unpleasant fairy, Captain Hook, Tiger Lily, the lost boys and - of course - Wendy, but then it wouldn't have been a classic since the original stage production in 1904 and the novel of 1911 if it were otherwise.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Grahame_Wind|title=The Wind in The Willows|author=Kenneth Grahame and Robert Ingpen|rating=4|genre=Art|summary=Kenneth Grahame's ''The Wind in the Willows'' was one of the defining books of my streetchildhood and more than sixty years after I first read the book I've just recently passed it onto another young reader. Since the book was first published in 1908 there have been some notable illustrators: Paul Bransom provided illustrations for the 1913 edition, Ernest H Shepard (perhaps better known for his illustrations of ''Winnie the Pooh'') in 1933, Arthur Rackham (possibly the leading illustrator from the golden age of book illustration) in 1940 and Robert Ingpen who illustrated the centenary edition of ''The wildly popular @dogs_of_instagramWind in the Willows''.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Jenkins_100|title=Britain's 100 Best Railway Stations|author=Simon Jenkins|rating=5|genre=Art|summary=In the mid-twentieth century, the railway was something which harked back to the Victorian age with trains being supplanted by cars and planes, run but steam was being replaced by Ahmed El Shourbagy oil, even then and in the twenty-first-century oil is giving way to electricity. It's cleaner, more environmentally friendly and the stations which we'd all rushed through as quickly as possible, keen to escape their grime, were restored and became places to be admired, possibly even lingered in. Simon Jenkins has chosen his wife Ashley hundred best railway stations.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Hurst_Norfolk|title=On My Way: Norfolk Coastal Walks|author=John Hurst|rating=4|genre=Art|summary=It was pure serendipity: after a five-hour drive, we were, annoyingly, left with an hour to fill in Blakeney before we could have the keys to our holiday cottage. There was an art exhibition in the church hall, so we went in - and launched just four years ago gives us this book found a display of over four hundred photographs of dogsthe most gorgeous pictures. Originally I 'd cheerfully have bought every one and hung them on our walls, but thought that I would have to make do with a couple of greetings cards when I saw ''On My Way: Norfolk Coastal Walks'' and I couldn't resist buying it.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Blackburn_Threads|title=Threads: The Delicate Life of John Craske|author=Julia Blackburn|rating=4|genre=Art|summary=John Craske was a fisherman, from a family of fishermen, who became too ill to go to sea. He was born in Sheringham on the north Norfolk coast in 1881 and would eventually die in the Norwich hospital in 1943 after a life which could have been defined by ill health. There were various explanations for what ailed him, what caused him to sink into a stupor, sometimes for years at a time and he was on occasions described as 'an imbecile'. But John had a natural artistic talent, albeit that his work had to be done on the available surfaces in his home. Chair seats, window sills, the backs of doors all carried his wonderful pictures of the sea. Then he moved on to embroidery, producing wonderful pictures of the Norfolk coast - and, most famously, of the evacuation at Dunkirk.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Bray Titania|title=Titania and Oberon|author=Jo Manton, Phyllis Bray and David Buckman |rating=4|genre=Art|summary=''noEquus, Waiting for Godot and A Mid-summer Night's Dream'' intention – three very distinctive plays, and my favourite three, out of reviewing which you won't often get me choosing just one. But were I to do so, it: might actually be the last, for the simple reason that I would delight in fact playing any and all characters from it. Yes, I know Hermia and Helena look a bit implausible now – but I wasnput it to you stranger things happen on stage… Some of the strangest things involve a player himself, a lowly actor who gets given an ass't even intending s head and is forced to read be enamoured of a fairy queen. It's this section of the play that this bookconcentrates on, in quite stunning form.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=BM_Origami|title=Origami, just Poems and Pictures|author=The British Museum|rating=5|genre=Art|summary=Sometimes you find a delight of a book. On an afternoon when it was unseasonably cold and decidedly wet I discovered ''Origami, Poems and Pictures'' and I was transported to have a quick flick throughJapan. As the title suggests we're looking at three celebrated arts and crafts: the ancient art of paper folding, haiku poetry and painting. I'll confess that it was the origami which caught my attention, but within five minutes I was showing other people surprised by the extent to which the rest of the book caught my imagination. We begin with something very simple: a boat and in case you're worried, all the entries have a degree of difficulty (from 'simple' through to 'tricky') and this one is at the lowest level. }}'{{Frontpage|isbn=Foreman_Travel|title=Travels With My Sketchbook|author=Michael Foreman|rating=4|genre=Art|summary=I guess the office best children's literature can do away with complete veracity, as long as it has something about it that is recognisable – a little of the picture spirit, heart and character of the Weimaraner riding real thing, whatever it may be. And if that's the case then it definitely applies to children's literature illustrations, such as those provided close on two hundred times by [[:Category:Michael Foreman|Michael Foreman]]. This prolific artist leapt at a bicyclescholarship in the US when he'd completed his official, formal studies, and it would appear – huge credits list regardless – that he's never stopped moving since, as this book takes us to all corners of the world, and back home again.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=Biesty Trains|title=Stephen Biesty's Trains|author=Ian Graham and Stephen Biesty|rating=5|genre=Art|amazonuksummary=<amazonuk>1452151970</amazonuk>Trains look imposing, but true fans (little boys, usually from about three years old and upwards) want to know what lies beneath the skin which you can see. They want to know how it works. Getting to grips with one in real life is quite a big ask, but the next best thing is ''Stephen Biesty's Trains'' which features trains from all over the world and spanning the early steam train (complete with cowcatcher) right through to the trains of the future which can reach a speed of 430 kph and don't even run on rails. Once the train reaches a speed of 150 kph the wheels are raised and the train is held up by magnetic forces alone.