Bothy Tales

I can move only with the aid of barrels of anti-inflammatory gel, sticking plasters and real ale anaesthetic. Martin and I descend from hours of walking to the small town of Middleton-in-Teesdale. I walk, stiff legged, into the campsite office and a plump, middle-aged woman looks up from her desk and can see the old timer is in trouble. “Oh, what a shame you weren’t here last week,” she says, pity radiating from behind her horn-rimmed specs. “You’ve missed him.” I look at her, puzzled. “Elvis!” she explains. “You missed Elvis.” Oh God, now I’m hallucinating… In Bothy Tales, the follow-up to The Last Hillwalker from bestselling mountain writer John D. Burns, travel with the author to secret places hidden amongst the British hills and share his passion for the wonderful wilderness of our uplands. From remote glens deep in the Scottish Highlands, Burns brings a new volume of tales – some dramatic, some moving, some hilarious – from the isolated mountain shelters called bothies. Meet the vivid cast of characters who play their games there, from climbers with more confidence than sense to a young man who doesn’t have the slightest idea what he’s letting himself in for…

John D. Burns is a bestselling and award-winning mountain writer who has spent over forty years exploring Britain’s mountains. Originally from Merseyside, he moved to Inverness over thirty years ago to follow his passion for the hills. He is a past member of the Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team and has walked and climbed in the American and Canadian Rockies, Kenya, the Alps and the Pyrenees. John began writing more than fifteen years ago, and at first found an outlet for his creativity as a performance poet. He has taken one-man plays to the Edinburgh Fringe and toured them widely around theatres and mountain festivals in the UK. It is the combination of John’s love of the outdoors with his passion for writing and performance that makes him a uniquely powerful storyteller. His first two books, The Last Hillwalkerand Bothy Tales, were both shortlisted for The Great Outdoors magazine’s Outdoor Book of the Year. His third book, Sky Dance, was a finalist for the mountain fiction and poetry award in the Banff Mountain Book Competition. Wild Winter is his fourth book. He continues to develop his career as a writer, blogger, podcaster and outdoor storyteller while exploring the wild places he loves. If you would like to follow more of John’s journeys to bothies and wild places, and his adventures in the world of theatre, visit www.johndburns.com where you can read his blogs and listen to his podcasts.

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