The book deals with the evolution of village communities in west Northamptonshire, based originally on the underlying geology of the region, and following the gradual development through Roman, Saxon, Danish and Norman times, into and through the Middle Ages, and up to the eras of toll roads, canals, railways, and finally motorways. The village of Kilsby is used as an example, to illustrate the impacts of these successive developments, and the effects of such events as plague, Industrial Revolution, the parliamentary Enclosure Acts, Napoleonic wars etc., and drawing upon a wide range of source material. The author has also written other history books dealing with later developments in Victorian and subsequent times, in addition to a range of more scholarly papers and articles on the late mediaeval and early modern period.