A Lost Rural World | The Brensham Trilogy by John Moore | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

‘I first encountered Brensham during an arduous recovery from illness. A lifelong walker and seeker-out of hidden places, I was unable to wander much more than ten minutes from home, but to read John Moore was to be transported instantly away from the dreariness of recuperation to a fragrant field in high summer.’ – Sarah Perry

‘I have written a book which gives me much pleasure. It is a kind of full-length portrait of a small country town – this small town – between the wars. The sort of life that will never come back,’ John Moore wrote to T. H. White in the summer of 1945. That book was Portrait of Elmbury, the first volume in the trilogy based on his home town of Tewkesbury that Moore wrote shortly after the Second World War, following it in 1946 with Brensham Village and in 1948 with The Blue Field. Together the three books paint a picture of a lost rural world which is powerfully nostalgic yet unsentimental.

Though Moore wrote many more books and spent time in London, he always returned to Tewkesbury – for him a place where somehow ‘emotion seemed larger, pleasures were keener, sorrows sharper, the tragedy more profound and the comedy more riotous’ – and it is for his wonderful Brensham trilogy that he is best known. All three books are available as a bundle, Portrait of Elmbury in a Plain Foxed Edition and Brensham Village and The Blue Field as Slightly Foxed Editions.

Please scroll on to read Sarah Perry’s piece on John Moore, explore some other tempting titles and learn about an exciting competition which supports uncommissioned first-time writers in their biographical endeavours. Details on how to enter can be found at the bottom of this page.