The Wrong Kind of Snow

Review 'This year's Eats, Shoots and Leaves' ― Guardian ' ***** Smart and well-researched' ― Time Out 'Wonderful . . . full of fascination and amusement' ― Alan Titchmarsh, The Alan Titchmarsh Show 'A meteorological feast for every day of the year' ― Good Book Guide Well written and funny . . . a book you can give to almost anyone ― Elle Bags of charm ― The Sunday Times 'Brilliant idea' ― Daily Mail The perfect stocking-filler ― Independent This book is jam-packed with grand themes ... first-rate and really well-researched ... a fascinating book, based on a very clever idea and very intelligently done. ― Daily Mail Endlessly fascinating... It is well researched and written with flair and a feel for the drama of the moment - the perfect book for ensuring you have something to say during that awkward moment at the water cooler. ― Financial Times Product Description It is a fact universally acknowledged that the British are obsessed with the weather. This is not surprising as no country in the world has such unpredictable weather, with such power to rule people's lives. THE WRONG KIND OF SNOW is the complete daily companion to this national phenomenon. From the Spanish Armada to the invention of the windscreen wiper, each of the 365 entries beautifully illustrates a day in the weird and wonderful history of the British and their weather. 31 January: The Big Freeze of 1963 brings the FA Cup competition to a halt: every football pitch in Britain is frozen: the third round takes 66 days to complete: the Pools Panel is formed as a result. 9 February: British Rail blames the 'Wrong Kind of Snow'. It was a journalist's phrase, but on this day in 1991 it stuck to the beleagured BR like flesh to ice. 15 July: The exceptionally hot and steamy summer of 1858 caused the Great Stink of London, resulting in the building of London's sewage system, still in use today. On the same day in 1930, rainfall in Yorkshire was so heavy that the Whitby lifeboat makes a rescue two miles inland. 10 September: A violent storm rather than British sea power defeats the Spanish Armada in 1588. Had the weather held and the fleet reached home, it would have been hailed as a Spanish triumph. Four centuries later, bad light and rain stop play at the Oval . . . And much much more. Review 'This book is jam-packed with grand themes and first-rate and really well-researched trivia... a fascinating book, based on a very clever idea and very intelligently done' Review 'Endlessly fascinating... It is well researched and written with flair and a feel for the drama of the moment - the perfect book for ensuring you have something to say during that awkward moment at the water cooler.' Book Description THE WRONG KIND OF SNOW is the bestselling daily companion to the unpredictable British weather - a national phenomenon that obsesses us all. About the Author Robert Penn developed a passion for the weather while riding a bicycle around the word. This was reinforced during a year touring the Celtic Fringe as a poet, in bucketing Welsh rain (tywallt), Irish thunderstorms (speirling), and Scottish drizzle (smur) during a record wet summer writing his first book The Sky is Falling on Our Heads. A journalist, he writes regularly for all the national broadsheets. Antony Woodward was first caught out by the British weather aged 0, when he was born in a Land Rover stuck in a snowdrift during the notorious winter of 1963. He's won many awards as an advertising copywriter and, since learning to fly - the subject of his first book, Propellerhead - most of his adult life has been spent waiting for fog to lift, the wind to shift or the skies to clear. Both authors now live with their families - in dense cloud- in the Black Mountains, South Wales.