Rebecca Costa’s The Watchman’s Rattle: Thinking Our Way Out of Extinction  explores why societies struggle to solve complex problems even when the evidence is clear and the stakes are high. The title refers to the wooden rattle carried by medieval night watchmen, shaken to warn the town of approaching danger — a metaphor for the early warning signs that societies often ignore until it is too late. Costa argues that complexity can exceed our cognitive limits, leading to paraly

Alice Roberts’ new series,  Lost Grail , revisits one of Britain’s most enduring questions: how much of the Arthurian tradition is rooted in real landscapes, real leaders, and real moments of crisis? Her approach—clear-eyed, evidence-led, and grounded in archaeology—offers a timely reminder that legends often emerge from periods of profound uncertainty. Prof Mark Horton and I explored the same question surfaced during field trials whilst preparing for heritage work in Mali. W

As Thorpeness contends with storms causing sudden erosion of the coastline and the loss of homes to the sea, it can be helpful to be reminded of the long view. Coastal change reshapes not just shorelines but entire communities — their economies, their social fabric, their sense of who they are. The story of Walberswick, just a few miles down our coast, shows us how profound that reshaping can be. Walberswick, at the mouth of the Blyth estuary, offers a clear example. Its seve

There are places where the land seems to hesitate, as though unsure whether to continue or to give itself up to the sea. The Suffolk coast is one of them. It is a coastline that lives with its own impermanence — a place where the horizon is both a comfort and a warning. Juliet Blaxland sensitively captured this tension in The Easternmost House  and The Easternmost Sky , books that have become quiet companions to many who live along this shifting edge. Her reflections offer m