"Truly to be present is to be in this place here, and in this moment now –- not drawn or drained elsewhere, not distracted or disenchanted. This, surely, is part of the wonder of mountains: that immense power they have to ground us in the present, whether through the focus that risk brings -- or the stop-in-your-tracks beauty of starlight glittering on snow or a rainbow hooped over a river valley.

"In an age in which our attention is being fracked and monetised by predatory algorithms, it is right to celebrate other forms of encounter and allegiance.The books and writers in this year's KMBF all do so. The stories they tell are of close touch and deep time, of ancient stories and possible futures, of rock and bird and blizzard and footfall, of salt spray and moonlight, of love and fears and dreams. Together, they weave for us a sense of what it means to be present upon this fragile, wondrous Earth we each briefly call home."