Saturday Signing – Meet Local Author Mark Armstrong

Come and meet local author Mark Armstrong and pick up a signed copy of his book of Short Stories – In a Foreign Field.

Six men left British shores, and all that they knew, to fight in a foreign field which seemed as impossible and as daunting as a trip to the moon. How would they respond to long periods of deprivation, crushing fear and the unknowable reactions of their fellow man in extremis? The six stories illuminate the tragedy of conflict and how it mostly leaves an imprint, for better or worse, on the men who took part.

After living in a variety of locations across England, Mark studied Landscape Architecture at Art College and subsequently became a Chartered Surveyor. He spent a career managing all aspects of the built and natural environment both professionally and for pleasure. He has worked and lived within rural communities, cared for historic gardens, parkland, country houses and working buildings, from deepest Shropshire to Warwickshire, both with the National Trust and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

During that time, he has nurtured a keen interest in saving and preserving these wonderful monuments to those people who lived in them and is now Chair of the Avoncroft Museum of Buildings and a Trustee of the Compton Verney House Trust.

A former resident of Kenilworth and lifelong walker along the coasts, moorlands, hills and mountains throughout the British Isles, Mark seeks to record these special places through the medium of watercolour.

Thinking about the lives and values of people shaped by their lived-in landscapes and having to make choices in times past, inspired Mark to turn to writing his first collection of six short stories… In a Foreign field.