THE Bookery is delighted to welcome bestselling historian Dr Ian Mortimer for an evening celebrating the publication of his remarkable new book Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England at 7pm on Friday, September 18.

Ian will be joined in conversation by Catherine Courtenay, Editor of Devon Life magazine.

Set in Mearsdon, the house where Mortimer lives in Moretonhampstead on the edge of Dartmoor, this fascinating new book offers a strikingly original way of seeing England’s past.

Drawing on documentary records of the owners who lived there since the 1260s, and on a site whose origins may reach back to the eleventh century, Mortimer blends the broad sweep of national history with the intimate detail of local lives and changing daily experience.

From the Norman Conquest to the present day, Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England introduces the people who passed through this Devon house across nine centuries, showing how great national events from the Black Death and the Prayer Book Rebellion to the Civil Wars and the two world wars shaped a rural community in deepest Devon.

Rich in character, atmosphere and insight, it is social history on an unusually human scale, revealing the changing world through the eyes of those who lived within it.

Catherine Courtenay is a Devon-born journalist and Editor of Devon Life magazine, whose career spans regional newspapers, reporting and features, covering subjects from community events to major issues, including reporting linked to the war in Afghanistan, before moving into magazine editorship in editorial leadership roles. Catherine lives near Umberleigh with her husband and their dog Ralf.

Tickets cost £6 and are available from The Bookery or via thebookery.org.uk.

Ticketholders receive 10 per cent off purchases of Through the Windows of an Ordinary House on the evening.