Category: Granta Books

Islander – A Journey Around Our Archipelago – Patrick Barkham

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Islander – A Journey Around Our Archipelago by Patrick Barkham

How many times have you heard the expression ‘We are an island race’ This is of course true but how many of you actually know how many islands there are around Britain? The answer is a staggering 6,289 but not all are inhabited. For the nature writer Patrick Barkham who has been shortlisted for his books The Butterfly Isles and Badgerlands returns with Islander-A Journey Around our Archipelago were he island hops to discover how life really is and the natural history of the Islands that make up our wonderful country.

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I have been lucky enough to island hop around our coastline while studying wildlife but here in this outstanding book Patrick Barkham visits some islands we may never get the chance to visit, such as South Ronaldsay, Eigg, St. Kilda, and also Rathlin among others. Along the way he talks about the ecology of the islands and culture as well as meeting the wildlife of the islands.

Anyone who has watch Whisky Galore will know the story was written by Sir Compton Mackenzie who loved islands so much he actually liked buying islands as well this may account for his love of isolation. Along the way Barkham meets the people of the islands who live and work on the islands. Some of the islands he visits can be described as remote. It can be a hard life and the weather extreme and some of the islands can easily be cut off for days or weeks at a time. Then of course there is the uniqueness of each of the islands and also the geo politics. The people work the land but they also have to run the islands as well.

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Some of my favourite islands are those on the West Coast of Scotland and also the Scilly Islands. Life can be extreme to say the least but time spent on these islands changes you as a person. What really stands out for me is Barkham’s writing on natural history aspects of the islands and how species have developed away from the mainland.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that Patrick Barkham will make the longlist for the 2018 Wainwright Prize with this wonderful account of just a few of our islands dotted around Britain’s coastline.

368 Pages.

 Thank you Lamorna Elmer and Granta Books for the review copy of Islander by Patrick Barkham

Islander – A Journey Around Our Archipelago by Patrick Barkham is published by Granta Books and was published on 5th October 2017 and is available through Waterstones, Amazon and all good bookshops.

First Love by Gwendoline Riley

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First Love by Gwendoline Riley

Delighted at last to discover the writing of Gwendoline Riley and her latest novel First Love which you may think could well be a love story, actually this is something yet more terrifying in an all-consuming little book that I devoured on a train journey to London at times brutal and visceral we see a couple’s marriage falling apart and every sinew of human emotion exposed on every page.

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We are introduced to Neve who is a thirty something writer and she is married to Edwyn who is older and is suffering from an illness which means he is pain a lot of the time and this is something that is constantly there. To understand Neve we have to turn the pages of time back to when she was a child and watched her parent’s marriage fail and then the ensuing divorce. Neve decided that she wanted distance from both parents especially her bullying father yet at the same time she cannot cut the ties with him. By the time she was in her twenties alcohol played a part in her life and bounced through friendships and partners and yet there is a sense of loneliness at the same time even when she spent time France.

Now with Edwyn that sense of loneliness is still present as Edwyn is a controlling character who recognises that he can control Neve by throwing childish tantrums to get attention and can become moody at the toss of a coin, there is obviously something missing from this marriage and that is Love in all its forms. For Neve one senses that she misses any form of affection as there is nothing there even sex is non-existent in the marriage. Is the Neve’s family past being played out in their own marriage or is this just Edwyn covering for his own failures and is he trying to get Neve to just accept that that is the best she is going to get in life? Despite the gloomy scenario there are some amusing parts in the story which Neve as the narrator takes the reader on the journey with her.

There is also a sense that you get when reading First Love is that Neve is not only trying to understand herself but the life around her and how best to cope as their marriage hits the rocks one minute then the next everything is OK.. She must have looked at her life as we look at a snow globe after it has been shaken.

First Love is one of those novels that is raw and human in that it exposes what life is like behind the closed doors of some people’s lives as we are invited into Neve’s world. At times it is shattering yet Riley’s writing is dazzling as she explores human frailties and at the same time incredibly moving.

Thank you to Granta Books for the advanced review copy.

First Love by Gwendoline Riley is published by Granta Books and is available through Waterstones, Amazon and all good bookshops.