Relish the exoticism on your doorstep

JOHN GREEN savours a laconic, witty and evocative exploration of the overlooked beauties of lesser and unknown Britain

Book Review / 29 September 2026 The Long Version: the superb portrait of a middle-aged feminist 29 September 2026 HELEN VASSALLO explores a brilliant and anarchic novel that situates its gutsy protagonist between tradition and radicalism

MARK TURNER points to the paradoxical pleasures and glaring omissions provided by contemporary ‘tribute’ jazz performances

DAVID NICHOLSON enjoys a tragic view of the artist’s life by a company hit by redundancies, industrial action and public protests

PETER MASON is impressed by the political charge of Sting’s musical tale of shipyard closure

HERE, Chris Moss valiantly attempts the virtually impossible: to persuade us that there is enough undiscovered beauty and historical interest on our own doorstep without having the need to ratchet up air miles and burn gallons of petrol to reach exotic destinations. 

If you still demand sandy beaches, hot sunshine and cocktails on the terrace, then Warrington may not be an acceptable alternative, although even that perspective could change as a result of global overheating.

In this volume of collected and expanded essays, he takes us on tours of the lesser- or unknown towns of Britain, from Birkenhead to Newport, Ipswich to Gateshead, Armagh to Paisley via many others.

His style, as you can discover from this short sentence, is laconic, witty and descriptively evocative: “Port Sunlight is a shock after a morning on the malevolent motorways, the heaving A41 and a drive past Stanlow’s oil refineries, chemical plants, fertiliser manufacturers and uranium enrichment factory…”. 

His writing is certainly entertaining and informative, perhaps more so than the towns themselves. He has undertaken meticulous research and provides useful insights into Britain’s more recent history. 

Although he remains a tourist passing through, he demonstrates that you don’t have to be a dumb one and you are given the impression that he takes these places seriously and shows them respect.

He makes many interesting connections, as for instance when he writes how the development of Port Sunlight as a model industrial village on the Wirral Peninsula founded in 1888 by the industrialist  William Hesketh Lever (later Lord Leverhulme) was the inspiration for Ebenezer Howard’s later Garden City Movement.

As he himself puts it: “Reiterations, connections, echoes, recollections. That’s how I have come to know Britain all over again.” For Moss, his meanderings have been “edifying and enlightening” and “the effort has always been rewarded with something of value to my broader education, occasionally a small epiphany.” Most readers will express the same about his book.

He doesn’t prettify but does give us numerous examples of magnificent architecture, often ignored or little known, as well as examples of misguided planning, derelict buildings and intriguing artefacts. He deplores the evidence he finds of widespread demolitions of our architectural heritage and the indiscriminate removal of what is of value. He describes the brutal vandalism by the local administration of the Welsh town of Wrexham despite vocal opposition.

His descriptions, as he himself writes, are “generally positive and I have tried to see what can be valued rather than lamented or decried.” Although he does admit that “a word cloud of my text would find ‘sad’ and its variants surfacing again and again.” As in his visit to Crewe, that once “veritable railway colony” — a huge junction, the gateway to north and south via train.

You might not so readily be prepared to give up the pina coladas under the palm trees on a Caribbean island or the vibrant Mediterranean sunshine and al fresco dining, but Chris Moss’s is book is certainly a sharp antidote to such destinations and a provocative thesis. 

And there is no doubt much of interest and enjoyment on our own doorstep but few of us could honestly say they know many such places in their own country.

Book Review / 3 July 2026 Hard urban stories 3 July 2026 CHRIS SEARLE welcomes a startling vision of contemporary Newport from a veteran photographer of the British working class

Exhibition review / 22 May 2026 Roy Oxlade: Britain’s brilliant tearaway 22 May 2026 MIRANDA RICHMOND relishes the gloriously liberated art of Roy Oxlade, and traces his method back to the thinking of David Bomberg, his acknowledged teacher  

Exhibition review / 3 March 2026 ‘Music remains an intrinsic part of us during migration’ 3 March 2026 SIMON PARSONS applauds an artist who rescues and rehumanises stories of women, the victims of violence, from a feminist perspective

Book Review / 30 September 2025 A great African modernist 30 September 2025 JOHN GREEN welcomes a remarkable study of Mozambique’s most renowned contemporary artist