The Doon Valley Across the Years is a wonderful anthology that takes the reader through fact and fiction, history and legends, myths and folklore of the Doon as it was over the last two centuries and more. Wedged on four sides by the Shivaliks and Himalayan ranges, the rivers Yamuna and Ganga, is the oasis of the Doon through which innumerable explorers, adventurers and settlers have come and gone, leaving behind their impressions in words. The Anglo-Indian family of the Hearseys, who were diddled of their rightful title by the not-so-honourable John Company. F. Bodycot, H.C. Williams, editors of the Mussoorie Times, and G.R.C. Williams, whose Memoir of the Doon stands like a bookmark amongst literature on Dehra Dun, one of the early administrators, Capt. Frederick Young, who is today remembered for pioneering the hill-stations of Landour and Mussoorie are just some of the names which feature in this book. This assemblage, with its many more interesting tidbits, is sure to take you down the ages of the Doon valley. In spite of the changes that dot the valley, its very essence remains as fragrant as ever.
