Who hasn’t dreamed of packing it all in and setting off on an adventure? Ten years ago, former teacher Julie Brominicks made that common fantasy a rare reality by undertaking an epic walk around Wales’ borders for new book, The Edge Of Cymru.

Starting in her hometown in Machynlleth and traversing the entire length of the coastline and border with England, Brominicks uses her journey both to celebrate Wales’ natural landscape and highlight the damage climate change is wrecking upon it. This conflict is echoed in her writing style which shifts regularly – and somewhat jarringly – between the poetic and the stark as her joy at the wildlife she encounters is constantly undercut by her fears for its future.

Hailing from Shrewsbury, Julie Brominicks’ outsider perspective in The Edge Of Cymru makes her an insightful guide to modern Wales and travel around its borders, drawing attention to divisions in its identity, culture and language. As always with Wales though, it is the people that bring it to life. Encounters with a kindly ticket inspector in Port Talbot and a flirtatious old man in Burry Port inject some much-needed humour into the narrative: you wish Brominicks had focussed a little less on the edges of Cymru and a little more on the people who make up its heart.