Upon A White Horse

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What to expect

'Packed with anecdote and colour, it's a surprisingly touching portrait of the countries' - Financial Times, Best Books of 2025

'I'm a card-carrying admirer of Peter Ross' - Robert Macfarlane

The prehistoric sites of Britain and Ireland are places of wonder and wondering. Who made these structures? What did they mean to them? And what do they mean to us now?

Author of the bestseller Steeple Chasing and prize-winning A Tomb With A View, Peter Ross journeys from midwinter at Stonehenge to midsummer at Sycamore Gap. Along the way he encounters bog bodies in Dublin, a wooden goddess in Edinburgh and a chalk giant in Dorset. He asks what it is like to live within the great stone circle at Avebury, what rituals occurred in an Anglesey tomb and what draws volunteers to care for the Uffington White Horse.

These objects and structures speak of the long human story. They offer the comfort of recognition and the pleasure of mystery. There is something about ancient places that fills a hollow in our souls.

Upon A White Horse is a celebration of landscape and people - and all that is beautiful, strange and old.

PRAISE FOR STEEPLE CHASING:

'A delicious treat' - Financial Times

'A charming odyssey' - The Times

'Lovely, lyrical, whimsical, elegiac' - TLS

'Engaging' - New Statesman

'A wonderful book' - Daily Telegraph

Critics Review

This fascinating paean to the ancient monuments of the UK is an evocatively lyrical work . . . Ross writes with reverence as well as humour, and there's a pilgrim quality to his travels. The pace of these tributes is gentle, befitting the enduring presence of these mysterious sites in the modern world
The Field
Ross scores highly on his intuitive interpretations of places and his non-judgemental observations of human nature; he is empathetic, but can stand back
Country Life
Ross is always lucid, almost reverent, about the whole process of archaeological discovery
Books from Scotland
In unravelling the histories of these sites and the motivations of those who care for them, [Ross] finds that they still have a role to play - even in our modern world
Wanderlust, Stanfords' top winter travel reads
A beautifully written book of traces and absences . . . One of the characteristics that makes Peter Ross a fine journalist is his capacity to be unobtrusive. He does not showboat nor monopolise the story, letting others speak instead . . . The most autobiographical glances and snatches are the most moving and revealing of the book
The Scotsman
Ross's last two books, Steeple Chasing and A Tomb With A View, were outstanding, and Upon A White Horse lives up to that excellence, with his pilgrimage to prehistoric sites and places of ancient enchantment a meandering journey on which it is a privilege to be able to accompany him
Scottish Field
Fascinating . . . [Ross] has a poetic, meditative style, with a sharp eye for detail and a keen sense of humour . . . As well as bringing the sites and monuments vividly to life, he delves into issues of archaeology, folklore, faith and identity, while weaving in elements of personal memoir
Geographical
Fascinating
The Herald
Packed with anecdote and colour, it's a surprisingly touching portrait of the countries
Financial Times, Best Books of 2025
The solidity of stone, the fragility of chalk, the enigma of Silbury Hill, and the brutal practicality of the Antonine Wall all lift into vivid life through conversations elicited from those he meets along the way . . . observant, engaging, and informative
Church Times

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