I have been living in the south of France for 25 years, and through my books I endeavour to share my love for the history, landscapes and gastronomy of the south of France, the Pyrenees and northern Spain.

My writing is based on an insatiable curiosity about my adopted home. This might lead me inside the ruins of an abandoned château for the ambiance, or into one that is still inhabited for a glass of wine; into a farmer's field to inspect a traditional crop, or to a food festival to taste the harvest; down prehistoric caves in search of the first homo sapiens to arrive in the south of France, or over Pyrenean peaks on ridiculously long trail runs. Underpinning these true-life experiences is desk-based research, primarily drawing on historical texts, and academic and scientific papers in several languages.

​I do not write fiction. Instead, I focus on geographical history, gastronomic history and long-form journalism, the sort of writing that requires perseverance, dedication, imagination, instinct, an obsession with detail and preferably a large dose of luck.

In 2025, Yale University Press bought the world rights to my forthcoming book about the history of the Pyrenees. It will be published in hardback on 25 August 2026. The paperback version will come out in 2027.