A-Z Liverpool Hidden Walks: Discover 20 Routes In and Around the City by Claire E. Rider and Neil McDonald

I spent my formative years in the city of Liverpool and I thought that I really wouldn't need this book. How wrong I was. 

The A-Z Map Company, who produced this book, used to make road maps in a book format when I was a child and this is very reminiscent of those with regard to the size, being a tad shorter and wider than a conventional paperback. Inside are colour images of road maps in the A-Z style as well as  some excellent photographs of the architecture and landmarks of Liverpool. There is a key to the map symbols in the back and the walks are clearly marked.

As an added bonus to appeal to my historian side, the walks include information about the history of Liverpool. It is famed for producing music with a pronounced music scene during the 1960s with bands such as The Beatles, and one walk includes the Cavern Club and waterfront that includes a statue to commemorate the fab four. Of course, that is a very touristy thing, so it is  very impressive that one walk includes the seven streets from the Medieval era, which are worth seeing because, although no buildings from that time survive, the ones that are there are typical of the affluence that Liverpool achieved in later centuries. Another walk shows how that wealth was created: through the triangular slave trade at the height of the British Empire. Carvings often missed are pointed out on this walk, along with a visit to the Slavery museum and docks.

The stately home in the 'place of the deer' established by Edward the Confessor, the village listed in the Domesday Book, the site of a Medieval hunting forest as well as the two cathedrals, the port and docklands and the inspiration for all of those Beatles' songs...this book is absolutely fascinating.

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Published by Geographers’ A-Z Map Co Ltd on 16 March  2023.
​Advanced review copy supplied by the publisher.