Product details
- ISBN 9781399756051
- Weight: 172g
- Dimensions: 128 x 196mm
- Publication Date: 26 Feb 2026
- Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Paperback
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BOOK ONE IN THE CUMBRIAN TRILOGY
'An intensely moving, deeply worked book'
Sunday Telegraph
'Extraordinary'
The Times
'A magnificently strong and sinewy novel'
Sunday Mirror
In rural Cumbria at the turn of the nineteenth century, John Tallentire and his wife, Emily, struggle to make ends meet. First as a farm labourer, then a coal miner, John dreams of breaking free from his humiliating status as a 'hired man'. But in a rapidly changing world, the couple find themselves caught between the demands of daily survival and striving for a better life.
Melvyn Bragg was born in Wigton, Cumbria, in 1939. He went to the local Grammar School and then to Wadham College, Oxford. He joined the BBC in 1961, and published his first novel, For Want of a Nail, in 1965.
He left the BBC and continued to write novels which include The Soldier's Return (WH Smith Literary Award), Without a City Wall (Mail on Sunday John Llewellyn Rhys Prize) and Now Is the Time (Parliamentary Book Award 2016). A Place in England, Son of War and Crossing the Lines were all nominated for the Booker Prize. His non-fiction includes The Adventure of English and The Book of Books, and his first memoir, Back in the Day, was published in 2022 to critical acclaim.
He edited and presented The South Bank Show from 1977 and hosted the BBC Radio 4 programme In Our Time from 1998. He has now retired from both. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society and of The British Academy. He was given a Peerage in 1998 and a Companion of Honour in 2017.
