**Shortlisted for the Portico Prize 2019**
The astonishing new work of non-fiction from the prize-winning author of The Gallows Pole and The Offing
Under the Rock is about badgers, balsam, history, nettles, mythology, moorlands, mosses, poetry, bats, wild swimming, slugs, recession, floods, logging, peacocks, community, apples, asbestos, quarries, geology, industrial music, owls, stone walls, farming, anxiety, relocation, the North, woodpiles, folklore, landslides, ruins, terriers, woodlands, ravens, dales, valleys, walking, animal skulls, trespassing, crows, factories, maps, rain - lots of rain - and a great big rock.
______________'Extraordinary, elemental ... never less than compelling: this is a wild, dark grimoire of a book' - TLS
'Exceptionally engaging ... beguiling ... this is a startling, unclassifiable book' - Stuart Kelly, The Scotsman
'Compelling ... admirable and engrossing. Myers writes of the rain with a poet's eye worthy of Hughes' - Erica Wagner, New Statesman
'A bone-tingling book' - Richard Benson, author of The Valley and The Farm
'A truly elemental read from which I emerged subtly changed... It has all the makings of a classic' - Miriam Darlington, author of Otter Country and Owl Sense



![Manchan, Magan IRISH INTEREST Magan Manchan: Listen to the Land Speak [2022] hardback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/manchan-magan-magan-manchan-listen-to-the-land-speak-2022-hardback-57197364117843_{width}x.jpg?v=1743077146)
![Ronayne, Sean IRISH BIOGRAPHY Sean Ronayne: Nature Boy: A memoir of birdsong and belonging by Seán Ronayne [2024] hardback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/ronayne-sean-sean-ronayne-nature-boy-a-memoir-of-birdsong-and-belonging-by-sean-ronayne-2024-hardback-1151370762_{width}x.jpg?v=1754583566)
![Demy, Hb BARGAIN IRISH INTEREST HB Demy: 9780717197361 [2023] hardback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/demy-hb-hb-demy-9780717197361-2023-hardback-60408208032083_{width}x.jpg?v=1734158111)
![Bersweden, Leif BARGAIN NATURE Where the Wildflowers Grow: My Botanical Journey Through Britain and Ireland [2022] hardback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/bersweden-leif-where-the-wildflowers-grow-my-botanical-journey-through-britain-and-ireland-2022-hardback-57567193694547_{width}x.jpg?v=1728119832)
![Daltun, Eoghan IRISH INTEREST Eoghan Daltun: An Irish Atlantic Rainforest [2024] paperback](http://chaptersbookstore.com/cdn/shop/files/daltun-eoghan-eoghan-daltun-an-irish-atlantic-rainforest-2024-paperback-58898347786579_{width}x.jpg?v=1748268952)