In this book, Gordon Beningfield returns to a favourite theme with which he has already delighted his audience in the best-selling titles HARDY COUNTRY and THE DARKLING THRUSH. Here is a portrait of the part of England where Thomas Hardy was born and where he set so many of his best-loved novels, short stories and poems. Published to coincide with the celebrations commemorating the 150th anniversary of Hardy's birth, this beautiful, lavishly produced book contains sumptuous reproductions of paintings which not only capture the spirit of the countryside that Hardy knew, loved and described so memorably, but also reflect the passion of a lifetime on the part of the artist.