Vanishing Landscapes

A rich and replenishing work that traces the roots, seeds, and cuttings of our modern sensibilities, weaving together the story of seven species to show us what was lost and what might be regained, and to remind us that before land became mere property, it was earth, life, livelihood, commons, and creation. I felt lovesick for it after it was done. – ELEANOR CATTONI really loved this book. It’s full of longing and nostalgia, but there’s a clear-sightedness here too, an acknowledgement of modernity’s gifts as well as its losses. Vanishing Landscapes conveys a delicate, informed state of enchantment - as much celebration as elegy. It’s a bittersweet love letter to what we have lost, and what exists around us in the here and now. – JENN ASHWORTHVanishing Landscapes offers a unique interweaving of insights about culture, cult and cultivation. From the history of cider apples and the deforestation caused by early modern warfare to the impact of republicanism on wine-drinking, this is a brilliantly ambitious and authentic cultural history. A real treasure. – ROWAN WILLIAMS, former Archbishop of CanterburySuch a clever construct using seven plants to embody a story that crosses counties, countries, and centuries. We witness, with great dramatic effect, the impacts of big political decisions being played out at a local level in the lives of ordinary people. When I read this, I began to realise that I’d known only half a narrative, and this fills in so many gaps in my understanding. – Derek Niemann

Bonnie Lander Johnson is Fellow and Associate Professor at Downing College, Cambridge University, where she teaches the literature and history of the early modern period and represents the University on the BBC/Cambridge National Short Story Award. Her academic books include Botanical Culture and Popular Belief in Shakespeare’s England (Cambridge University Press), The Cambridge Handbook to Literature and Plants, Chastity in Early Stuart Literature and Culture (Cambridge University Press) and Blood Matters (University of Pennsylvania Press). Bonnie is also a fiction and non-fiction writer. Her work has appeared in Hinterland, The Belfast Review, Howl and Dappled Things, and her fiction has been shortlisted for The Royal Society of Literature’s V. S. Pritchett Prize and The Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prize.