Join acclaimed travel writer and incurably curious hiker Tom Chesshyre in this celebration of the Peak District, Britain's first National Park, on its 75th anniversary 'Funny, fair and honest, and effortlessly readable' Matthew Parris In the heart of England lies a fascinating landscape of rugged dark gritstone plateaus and gentle green limestone valleys: the Peak District. But this national treasure hasn't always been open to all. On a spring day in 1932, 400 disgruntled ramblers embarked on a 'mass trespass' of Kinder Scout, the Peak's highest point. Their aim? To establish a right to roam across the land, against the wishes of wealthy owners. And in 1951 they finally got what they wanted: the Peak District was established as Britain's first national park. Home to striking dragon-back ridges of rock, vast expanses of peat, farms and villages, cloughs and caverns, the Peak is much more than the 'howling wilderness' described by Daniel Defoe three centuries ago. To mark the park's 75th anniversary, celebrated travel writer Tom Chesshyre hit the trails on a 360-odd mile ramble to find out how this dramatic landscape has fared - and to celebrate this symbolic home of hiking. Wild Peaks follows winding paths, pausing at old inns and mountain huts, and along the way meeting a rich cast of landowners, farmers, historians, mountaineers, publicans, rangers, right-to-roamers, travellers, mountain-rescue members, mystics, dreamers and fellow hikers.

Don your cagoule, grab a compass and join Tom as he explores how this place has changed, and how we have too. The Peak District National Park is 555 square miles (1,438 square kilometres) in size, and covers parts of Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Staffordshire, and Cheshire. Nearly 16 million people live within an hour's drive of the Peak District, including the cities of Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Nottingham, Derby, Huddersfield and Stoke-on-Trent. The towns of Glossop, Chapel-en-le-Frith, Buxton, Macclesfield, Leek, Ashbourne, Matlock and Chesterfield are on the national park's fringes. is at the foot of Kinder Scout, the area's highest summit. Other towns and villages fringing the park include Hayfield, Whaley Bridge, Hadfield, Tintwistle, Darley Dale and Wirksworth in Derbyshire, Stocksbridge in South Yorkshire and Marsden and Holmfirth in West Yorkshire. The Park's own population numbers around 40,000 and supports an estimated 18,000 jobs, predominantly through farming, manufacturing and tourism. People have lived here for over 10,000 years, shaping the landscape and leaving a wealth of cultural history.

It remains a lived-in landscape where industrial features make up one of the many layers of the landscape. The book will follow established walking routes and offer an entirely new one. There are Peak District National Park visitor centres in Bakewell, Castleton, Derwent and Edale. Tom Chesshyre is a vastly experienced author and happy to do bookshop events etc. We may try to partner with the National Park authority, National Trust and other organisations for promotion. Competition: The Full English; The Hidden Ways; Walking Home; The Old Ways; The Marches; Landlines; The Debateble Land; Footnotes; Between the Chalk and the Sea; A Line Above the Sky. Bill Bryson; Stuart Maconie; Alistair Moffat; Robert Macfarlane; Simon Armitage; Rory Stewart; Raynor Winn; Helen Mort; Graham Robb; Peter Fiennes.