Shortlisted for the Lakeland Book of the YearFirths and estuaries are liminal places, where land meets sea and tides meet freshwater. Their unique ecosystems support a huge range of marine and other wildlife: human activity too is profoundly influenced by their waters and shores.The Solway Firth – the crooked finger of water that both unites and divides Scotland and England – is a beautiful yet unpredictable place and one of the least-industrialised natural...

When Matt Myers decides to spend the summer with his mother at the Shell House, he little guesses that he is about to step into the minefield of his family’s past and recent history . . . Anne Church, a young Victorian; Matt, art student; Hazel Myers, his mother; and malacologist and parasitologist, Elizabeth Wilson.Their stories – of obsessional loves and conflicting beliefs – are inextricably linked with each other and with the life and tragic death of Victorian evangelist Emily ...

In June 1932 and June 1947, nearly all 11-year-olds who were attending school in Scotland sat a test of verbal reasoning. In the past decade, more than 1,500 of those people – now in older age – were recruited to the Lothian Birth Cohorts 1921 and 1936. The rich scientific data from those students have contributed to our knowledge about why some people's thinking skills age better than others. Each life, though, has stories, details and colour that are not captured by questionnaire...

People, flowers, memories: how do we preserve the past?Set in the Lake District, the shifting mosaic of the narrative explores life, love and prejudice through three very different women: Ruth, a taxidermist; Madeleine, a widowed sheep-farmer; and Lisa, a mathematician. As Lisa is drawn into the group it becomes clear that the other women have strange secrets: Ruth’s 'blogs' have an increasingly dark undertone - but these stark themes are offset by the warmth and humour of the rura...

Neoliberalism has been widely criticised because of its role in prioritising ‘free markets’ as the optimum way of solving problems and organising society. In the field of education, this leads to an emphasis on the knowledge economy that can reduce both persons and education to economic actors and be detrimental to wider social and ethical goals.Drawing on a range of international contexts across informal, adult, school and university settings, this book provides innovative example...