When I started to visit ancient churches more than thirty years ago, I discovered quite quickly that my tastes were particular. The older the better, the plainer the better – that pretty much sums up my preferences. While I’m delighted to have any opportunity to spend hours wandering around some Early English parish church filled with elaborate carving, statuary, and stained glass, I am happiest in the unadorned and simple interiors of Saxon and Norman places of worship. Don’t ask me why.

Peter Ross’s tastes, I’m glad to say, are more inclusive and embracing than mine. Steeple Chasing – Around Britain by Church is his account of wandering around such places just when the Covid-19 pandemic was starting to bite the UK. His tour includes some well known church treasures, for example Durham Cathedral and Westminster Abbey, but also less celebrated places of worship, ancient and not-so-old, like Pluscarden Abbey and small parish churches in Herefordshire and Yorkshire.

Ross’s book is not an architectural guide. Having said that, I learned a lot about individual churches, some of which I thought I knew well. His purpose is different; to understand what places of worship mean today, what functions they perform and what hold they continue to have even when so few people visit them for religious ceremonies or private prayer. It’s an important, valuable, and charming book, filled with anecdotes and personalities. It left me itching to re-start my own wandering around such places.

This collection of short stories first appeared in 2007, quite some time before Claire Keegan became the literary star she is now. The huge fanbase she has these days as a result of more recent books like Foster has led her publishers to re-issue many of her earlier books, and I’m happy about that.

Walk the Blue Fields has the feel of an early career book. The stories are uneven. Some hit the mark brilliantly, such as the title story and Surrender. Others don’t quite come off and the reader gets a sense of Keegan testing her reach and abilities. No matter. I’m planning on reading soon her debut collection, Antarctica, and that will complete my tour of the works of a writer who has become a firm favorite in such a short time.