Aurum's first collaboration with Guardian Books, A Lifetime of Mountains, a collection of Harry Griffin's much-loved Country Diary, was a beautiful book and a significant sales success, with 11,000 copies sold. For its second Guardian book, Aurum collects another popular Guardian column, this time by an Aurum author whose last book was a critical and sales success. Stephen Moss is the author of A Bird in the Bush: A Social History of Birdwatching, which has sold over 8000 copies already and been praised by John Carey in the Sunday Times and by Simon Barnes, author of How to be a Bad Birdwatcher. Moss's 'Birdwatch' column has over the years included nostalgic reminiscences on birdwatching as a child, accounts of birding expeditions to places as farflung as St Kilda and even Antarctica, of birding on his honeymoon in the Gambia, the birds on his garden feeder and, recently, introducing his toddler son to a first awareness of birds. Now, the best of these 'Birdwatch' columns are collected into a beautiful miniature hardback, tastefully designed and illustrated with line drawings, and together they build into a touching and fascinating chronicle of how one person's hobby has endured and evolved and in turn enriched a whole life.