A Portrait of the Tree: A celebration of favourite trees from around Britain

Lovely photos and good information and stories of each treeWas bought as a presant.

Interesting brilliant photographs, very inspirational.

Very pleased with this book. Not had time to immerse myself fully but the additional articles from different people add to its interest.Amazing photos. If I’m allowed one complaint, it says the author is known for his atmospheric photographs, they are a little too brooding for me I’d liked to have seen a few more in bright sunlight. But still a stunning book.

A heavy book of quality. Beautifully presented.

A bit of a mixed bag in that it has some fantastic photos, but in places the reproduction quality is actually very poor. For example, in the section on sycamore trees there is an image which seems to have large raindrops on the lens, and this is not the only example. In addition, some of the photos are out of focus (such as the one beginning the section magnolias). This may seem pedantic, but these are taken by a professional photographer and I would really expect better quality control when selecting images. Perhaps some of this is due to the relatively low print quality, which does not do some of the content justice. Maybe I just got a duff copy? It’s a shame, as it’s generally a good book with interesting text, but as a photographer myself I was left slightly underwhelmed. Others may well disagree!

Underwhelming I'm afraid. Whilst I laud the love and dedication of those who produced the book, the content lack substance, the narrative is weak and often repetitive, and there appears to be no rhythm or reason to the order off images which randomly flow backwards and forwards between oaks and various other species without one reference to the noble Hawthorn - or reference to our many other native species. The absence of Hawthorn is astounding since it has a proportionate nobility and legacy to that of the mighty oak. The beauty, age and 'wisdom' of Hawthorn is unquestioned so I was hugely disappointed not to see images of it. Repetition in the narrative (Adrian's introductory piece trods outside his field of expertise and traipses along into subject matter better treated by Kew Gardens in the succeeding pages). A good editor ahold have picked that up and should have insisted on order or 'natural flow' in the book and the accompanying images. This is a commercial project hoping for coffee table buyers, not any work of substance and therefore not for the lover of gardens or trees.