Pioneer, activist, environmentalist, poet. Ethel Haythornthwaite is virtually unknown, even in her hometown of Sheffield—the UK's outdoor city—yet her tireless campaigning led to the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949 and the creation of the Peak District National Park, protecting a wild and varied landscape so many have fallen in love with. Founder of a local society to protect rural scenery in 1924, she went on to join the Council for the Preservation of Rural England (CPRE) and become its wartime director. Saviour of the beautiful Longshaw estate, her achievements also include establishing the first green belt in the UK.

In Ethel, award-winning author Helen Mort explores the life of this countryside revolutionary. Having been given unrestricted access to Haythornthwaite's archive, including hundreds of meticulously written letters, Mort has written letters to Haythornthwaite's memory and a paean to her legacy. Born into wealth yet frugal, ever restless but infinitely patient, widowed at twenty-two, independent and thoroughly ahead of her time, Haythornthwaite helped save the British countryside at a time when simply being a woman was challenge enough.