Originally compiled in the 1950s and early 1960s, the Wainwright walking guides are perhaps the most distinctive and unusual such guides ever devised. The result of painstaking and lengthy research by their namesake and author over a period of thirteen years, the guides have retained their original format and design to this day. The books contain intricate hand drawn sketches by the author, detailing routes of ascent, and gradients of the hills in and around the Lake District and outlying regions. The seven guides covering the Fells district, as well as the Outlying Fells of Lakeland will be reissued by Frances Lincoln in April.