Jill Barklem drew Brambly Hedge the way other people build dolls houses, one impossible little room at a time, and the reason grown adults still stop dead in front of these pages is that she never cheated a single detail. The pantries are stocked. The staircases go somewhere. You can read the labels on the jars.

This slipcase holds the four books that started it, one for each season. In Spring Story the mice club together to throw Wilfred a birthday picnic. In Summer Story Poppy Eyebright and Dusty Dogwood get engaged and the whole hedge plans the wedding. In Autumn Story Primrose befriends the harvest mice and then loses her way in the chestnut woods. In Winter Story a heavy snowfall means the Snow Ball can be held for the first time in years.

Presented as a designed gift set marking forty years of Brambly Hedge, it is the version to hand over when you want the giving to feel like an occasion rather than an errand.