What a glorious world therein, even for those of us who are not huge fans of woods and forests, we all appreciate the natural world and the beauty of this country where we have chosen to, or been fortunate enough to live in.

Fortunately, we were given several months notice prior to our meeting as this book is not a quick or easy read. It is a personal and very idiosyncratic  account of the author's journey over 12 months of the year through twelve different woods and forests in the UK, a blend of nature writing, history, storytelling and personal musings.

Everyone had something positive to say about this book. There were a few of us who were less keen on the fairytales, most of which arose from the preceding chapter based on a specific woodland or forest. These traditional tales were retold by the author, who put her own contemporary spin on them, some of which were hilarious. All of us enjoyed the descriptions of the twelve forests and woodlands, even though a few mentioned that they were less happy about being  'deep in a wood or forest' in person. This led into an interesting discussion about personal childhood experiences and the impact this had on current emotional responses to nature generally. We also talked about the importance of freedom and exploration for children, along with storytelling and fostering imagination. 

Although we had certain reservations about some of the author's factual content, regarding the historical and geographical aspects of forests, and found a degree of repetition and slightly self-indulgent prose, we all thought this was a well worthwhile book one that we will return to. It is structured in such as way as to be a good book to dip into, a chapter at a time, to savour the sensory experiences of being deep in a forest, under the canopy, where the wild things are!