Mudlarking
Lost and Found on the River Thames
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4.6 • 9 Ratings
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- £8.49
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- £8.49
Publisher Description
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WINNER OF THE INDIE BOOK AWARD FOR NON-FICTION
THE TOP 2 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
A BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK
AN OBSERVER BOOK OF THE YEAR
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Mudlark (/'mAdla;k/) noun A person who scavenges for usable debris in the mud of a river or harbour
Lara Maiklem has scoured the banks of the Thames for over fifteen years, in pursuit of the objects that the river unearths: from Neolithic flints to Roman hair pins, medieval buckles to Tudor buttons, Georgian clay pipes to Victorian toys. These objects tell her about London and its lost ways of life.
Moving from the river's tidal origins in the west of the city to the point where it meets the sea in the east, Mudlarking is a search for urban solitude and history on the River Thames, which Lara calls the longest archaeological site in England.
As she has discovered, it is often the tiniest objects that tell the greatest stories.
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'Enchanting' - Sunday Times
'Driven by curiosity, freighted with mystery and tempered by chance, wonders gleam from every page' - Melissa Harrison
'Brilliant. No one has looked at these odd corners since Sherlock Holmes' - Sunday Telegraph
'The very best books that deal with the past are love letters to their subject, and the very best of those are about subjects that love their authors in return. Such books are very rare, but this is one' - Ian Mortimer
'Fascinating. There is nothing that Maiklem does not know about the history of the river or the thingyness of things' - Guardian
'A treasure. One of the best books I've read in years' - Tracy Borman
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
For 15 years, Lara Maiklem has been a mudlarker, someone who scours the Thames foreshore for treasure. This show-and-tell of the objects she’s discovered—Neolithic flint, Roman weaponry, unexploded ammunition, love letters—forms a fascinating and informative history of London. And it’s a history that isn’t often told—that of the city’s everyday folk, including Maiklem’s own boat-building ancestors. Much of the book is illuminated by her infectious enthusiasm but there are darker moments too. Her more unsettling finds include human remains and parts of a gun apparently used for nefarious means, while a pair of particularly aggressive drunks are among the alarming perils she faces by the water.
