| PRESS RELEASE
8TH DECEMBER 2024 –
INTO THE ENCHANTED FOREST WITH CALLUM PUBLISHED BY BLKDOG
Out now with Amazon Books and leading bookstores
Julian Roup’s seventh book has just been published in time for Christmas. This sequel to: ‘Into the Secret Heart of Ashdown Forest – A Horseman’s Country Diary’ finds the author and his huge Warmblood horse Callum once more back on their home turf.
For Roup his horse is not only transport across a storied landscape, but a portal into magic, a means of meditation on the move and medicine for the body and the soul. The relationship of love and respect between this man and his horse is palpable as is the ever-present edge of danger in riding an 18 hand Warmblood alone deep into the depths of Ashdown Forest in East Sussex, home of Winnie the Pooh and his friends.
For Roup the horse is a means of hanging onto the wonder of childhood well into his seventies. The magic of the woods makes it onto the page with writing that is filled with beauty and a power of peace that comes from being at one with nature.
He has once again written a forest riding memoir that carries us with him deep into the woods for days of forest bathing. When Callum and his rider go down to the woods, we know there will always be surprises. Come along for the ride and you may be surprised too. Discover secret places and hidden dells, poetry and writers, the ghosts of Roman soldiers, an Iron Age hill fort, VI & II rocket craters and endless beauty.
This book continues the story that began in his first volume about Callum and their travels. Callum is an 18-hand chestnut Warmblood with four white socks, half Irish Sports Horse and half German Oldenburg. He is a fascinating character, part pussycat and part tiger. Horse and rider have had moments of excitement and danger, yet this loveable rogue has patently stolen his rider’s heart.
Callum adores the forest and moves through it with the grace of the great ballet dancer Nureyev. Together horse and rider have criss-crossed miles of purple heathland and ventured into the forest’s deepest secrets. Roup says of his mount: “He is in effect my co-author as he inspires me to write. Ashdown is already a literary landscape thanks to A.A. Milne and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – stories lie thickly all about one here.”
Neither horse nor rider is quite in the first flush of youth. Callum has battled a damaged check ligament and changes to one hoof, while Roup has undergone a total knee replacement.
Even so, nothing can diminish the magic that lives within this ancient landscape, home to Winnie the Pooh and his friends, herds of deer, the occasional boar and even, once, a glimpse of a lion.
This deeply personal book invites us on a journey to discover the magic that lies within this enchanted forest.
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT BENDIGO COMMUNICATIONS
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