This book, printed in hardback and adorned with a golden green man, has a glorious weight to it. It announces itself as ‘A Right to Roam call to action’ and is made up of a patchwork quilt of short essays, spotlights on Wild Service in action and explorations of the Architecture of Belonging, including the rope swing and clootie tree.

Seeking to inspire ‘an urgent conversation… of the relationship between our communities and the land,’ Wild Service introduces the reader to Paul Powlesland, who explains how rivers can represent themselves within our legal, economic and political systems if they have a guardianship body willing to speak for their interests. Liz goes on to explain how she is combatting ‘plant blindness’ as part of the Rebel Botanists, who have begun labelling urban wild herbs by chalking their latin names on the pavement.

Romilly Swann talks through how she uses indigenous thinking styles to map out how she might best balance sheep grazing, human recreation and rewilding on land she rents near the community orchard. For Sam Lee, the sacred nature of the land is best approached through an attitude of homage, asserting that humans are a ‘storied species’ and that an ecosystem of connection is nourished through singing the stories back to the land.

All of these accounts intertwine to underline one overarching message, a call to demolish the belief that nature is something to be taken from, but rather something to be given back to, in reciprocity. Wild Service is broken down into many accessible components, with an openness to the fact that not all readers are comfortable with acts of trespass. The language is engaging, inspiring, and often poetic. The project, ‘Becca’s Butterfly Garden’ shows just how important single person, garden focused, initiatives can be, reassuring the reader that there’s a niche for everyone to carry out their own meaningful acts of Wild Service.