You are about to listen to a BBC podcast and I'd like to tell you a bit about what goes into making one.

I'm Sadata Sese, an assistant commissioner of podcasts for BBC Sounds.

I pull a lot of levers to support a diverse range of podcasts on all sorts of subjects,

relationships, identity, comedy, even one that mixes poetry, music and inner city life.

So one day I'll be helping host develop their ideas, the next fact-checking, a feature,

and the next looking at how a podcast connects with its audience, and maybe that's you.

So if you like this podcast, check out some others on BBC Sounds.

BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.

Today I'll be exploring two books which invoke the universal through the personal.

One, a love letter to the history and landscape of Wales, revealing the urgency of the climate emergency.

And the other, a long-lost novel by the the seminal American poet, novelist and essayist Richard Wright, which merges black

spirituality with a culture of fear as World War II looms large. And later, we'll be hearing

about a hotly-tipped novel, likely to be on everyone's to be red pile this spring. But first,

my guest Tom Buller grew up on a Welsh hill farm and in his most recent novel Adelands told the story

of 70 years of one farming family as the winds of modernity brought disruption to their rural

life. Adlands intimately explored the relationship between people and the landscape they inhabit,

and now in his latest work and non-fiction, that same relationship is explicitly explored.

This new book, Sorn Helen, is named after a Roman road which runs like a spine through Wales

from north to south, and Tom Buller walked this ancient path's length

and is with me now from his home in Breckenshire.

Tom, welcome to Open Book.

I wanted to begin by asking you what prompted you to put on your walking boots

...