Stanfords Blog

Map of the Month: ST&G’s Great British Wildlife & Environment Map

Stanfords Map of the Month for January 2022 is the ST&G’s Great British Wildlife & Environment Map .

Biodiverse Britain is a natural phenomenon to be reckoned with, the perfect environment for swanning about on wild adventures. From Orkney’s orcas to the seals of Scilly, Britain’s kaleidoscope of natural wonders is ripe for exploring, adoring and – most definitely – restoring. Enter this map, a semi-feral celebration of Britain’s species, habitats and the efforts being made to protect them.

Featuring over 1,500 wildlife hotspots, conservation projects, eco events and gloriously green days out, with handy summaries of key environmental issues and steps you can take to help address them, it’s the grassroots guide to having a whale of a time around wild Britain.

Book of the Month: Time on Rock

Stanfords Book of the Month for January 2022 is Time on Rock: A Climber’s Route into the Mountains by Anna Fleming. Available for £16.99.

This is a rock-climber’s eye view of the natural world, tracing a geological and personal journey across the British Isles over ten years. In Time on Rock Anna Fleming charts two parallel journeys: learning the craft of traditional rock climbing, and the new developing appreciation of the natural world it brings her.

Brilliant Maps

Maps that help put the last 12 months in some context

-by Ian Wright

I’m honoured that Brilliant Maps An Atlas for Curious Minds has been selected for Stanfords December book of the month. I really enjoyed writing it and hope you’ll enjoy reading it just as much.

Since December is the last month of the year, I thought I’d choose a few maps that help put the last 12 months in some context. And given Christmas is coming I can’t resist including a couple of Christmas themed maps too.

Monumental Tribute to Pioneer of Investigative Journalism: Nellie Bly

-by Rosemary J Brown

Journalist Nellie Bly made history on Roosevelt Island in New York City in 1887. On 10 December 2021 she did it again. I was there.

The Girl Puzzle monument, honouring the life and legacy of Nellie Bly, was unveiled steps away from the scene where she pioneered a brave new journalism. Investigative reporting was born when Bly feigned madness to investigate the brutality suffered by vulnerable women committed to the insane asylum on the island bordering Manhattan. Her accounts in The New York World and book Ten Days in a Mad-House horrified the public and brought about sweeping changes.

Mapping the North Wood

by C.J. Schüler

Hard though it may be to imagine today, until the end of the 18^th century oak woodlands stretched for seven miles along the range of clay hills that runs through southeast London from Brockley to Selhurst, straddling what was the Kent-Surrey border until the Local Government Act of 1889. Since a substantial part of the wood lay in the northern reaches of the manor of Croydon, it was known for much of its history as the North Wood, or Norwood, a name it bequeathed to the South London suburb that replaced it.

Out of this World Gifts

The Illuminates Series

The Illuminates cover everything in the cosmos, from stars and planets to the exploration of space. Written by astronomers and scientists who work at the iconic Royal Observatory Greenwich – big concepts are explained in bite-sized formats, so they’re a perfect gift for armchair astronomers.

Titles in this series are The Sun, Planets, Black Holes, Stars and Space Exploration. All are available for £9.99.

Muslim Europe in Five Sites

In his 2021 bestselling book, Minarets in the Mountains: a Journey into Muslim Europe, author Tharik Hussain tells the story of Europe’s living indigenous Muslim communities in countries like Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Albania and Montenegro, where they have been living for almost six centuries. Yet the story of Muslim Europe is actually as old as Islam itself. These five places of European Muslim heritage reveal the continent’s fourteen centuries of Islamic presence.

Map of the Month: Antarctica and the Arctic BAS

We thought we’d end the year with something new, so from now on we will be having a Map of the Month. Stanfords Map of the Month for December 2021 is the British Antarctic Survey’s Antarctica and the Arctic double-sided folded map.

Here’s Laura Gerrish, GIS and Mapping Specialist at British Antarctic Survey to tell us a bit more about this map:

Children’s Book of the Month: The Lights that Dance in the Night

The Stanfords Children’s Book of the Month for December 2021 is The Lights that Dance in the Night by Yuval Zommer.

A magical, lyrical ode to the soul-stirring beauty of the northern lights, and to the landscape and animals of the Arctic.

Book of the Month: Brilliant Maps

Stanfords Book of the Month for December 2021 is Brilliant Maps: An Atlas for Curious Minds by Ian Wright, illustrated by Infographic.ly with a foreword by Tim Harford.

See the world anew with this unique and beautifully designed infographic atlas.

Which nations have North Korean embassies? Which region has the highest number of death metal bands per capita? How many countries have bigger economies than California? Who drives on the ‘wrong’ side of the road? And where can you find lions in the wild?