In An Island Odyssey Hamish Haswell-Smith casts off in his forty-one-foot sloop Jandara, armed with his sketch pad and a route map of a journey first taken by Martin Martin in 1703. Haswell-Smith sets sail on a voyage that will take him to fifty-two different islands around the Scottish Coast, from Ailsa Craig in the Firth of Clyde to St. Kilda, Fair Isle and Bass Rock.
Filled with natural history, local legend and landscapes and accompanied by the author's own distinctive sketches and watercolours An Island Odyssey is a delightful way to discover or rediscover the romance, beauty and inescapable magnetism of the Scottish Islands.
Author : Hamish Haswell-Smith
Edition : Canongate Books Ltd, Paperback, 175 pages
ISBN : 9781782111757
Published : 3rd April 2014
Weight: 791g
Dimensions: 260 x 246 x 14mm
In Island Dreams, Gavin Francis examines our collective fascination with islands. He blends stories of his own travels with psychology, philosophy and great voyages from literature, shedding new light on the importance of islands and isolation in our collective consciousness.
Comparing the life of freedom of thirty years of extraordinary travel from the Faroe Islands to the Aegean, from the Galapagos to the Andaman Islands with a life of responsibility as a doctor, community member and parent approaching middle age, Island Dreams riffs on the twinned poles of rest and motion, independence and attachment, never more relevant than in today's perennially connected world.
Illustrated with maps throughout, this is a celebration of human adventures in the world and within our minds.
Author : Gavin Francis
Edition : Canongate Books Ltd, Hardback, 256 pages
ISBN : 9781786898180
Published : 1st October 2020
Weight: 640g
Dimensions: 221 x 162 x 25mm
New islands are being built at an unprecedented rate whether for tourism or territorial ambition, while many islands are disappearing or fragmenting because of rising sea levels. It is a strange planetary spectacle, creating an ever-changing map which even Google Earth struggles to keep pace with.
In The Age of Islands, explorer and geographer Alastair Bonnett takes the reader on a compelling and thought-provoking tour of the world's newest, most fragile and beautiful islands and reveals what, he argues, is one of the great dramas of our time.
From a 'crannog', an ancient artificial island in a Scottish loch, to the militarized artificial islands China is building in the South China Sea; from the disappearing islands that remain the home of native Central Americans to the ritzy new islands of Dubai; from Hong Kong and the Isles of Scilly to islands far away and near: all have urgent stories to tell.
Author : Alastair Bonnett
Edition : Atlantic Books, Hardback, 256 pages
ISBN : 9781786498090
Published : 7th May 2020
Weight: 460g
Dimensions: 221 x 147 x 29mm
"'It's over there,' John said as he pointed across the sea. I looked but all I could see was fog. 'There,' he persisted, 'you can just make out the outline of the castle.'"
From the tiny island that shaped the entire English language, to the island that terrified Dylan Thomas, there's more to Britain's tiny islands than you might think! Have your own tiny adventure by visiting any of the 60 remarkable little islands around Britain featured here. Although Britain boasts hundreds of tiny islands, Dixe Wills has selected just the very best of them for this book. Found around the coast, in lakes, in lochs and on rivers, these little worlds are waiting for you to discover them - whether you swim to them, walk to them at low tide, row to them, or catch a dinky little ferry.
Author : Dixe Wills
Edition : AA Publishing, Paperback, 320 pages
ISBN : 9780749573874
Published : 1st May 2013
Weight: 640g
Dimensions: 210 x 150 x 25mm
Winner of the 2020 Australian Prime Minister's Literary Award for nonfiction and the 2019 NSW Premier's History Awards for general history
For more than a millennium, Polynesians have occupied the remotest islands in the Pacific Ocean, a vast triangle stretching from Hawaii to New Zealand to Easter Island. Until the arrival of European explorers they were the only people to have ever lived there. Both the most closely related and the most widely dispersed people in the world before the era of mass migration, Polynesians can trace their roots to a group of epic voyagers who ventured out into the unknown in one of the greatest adventures in human history.
How did the earliest Polynesians find and colonise these far-flung islands? How did a people without writing or metal tools conquer the largest ocean in the world? This conundrum, which came to be known as the Problem of Polynesian Origins, emerged in the eighteenth century as one of the great geographical mysteries of mankind.
For Christina Thompson, this mystery is personal: her Maori husband and their sons descend directly from these ancient navigators. In Sea People, Thompson explores the fascinating story of these ancestors, as well as those of the many sailors, linguists, archaeologists, folklorists, biologists and geographers who have puzzled over this history for three hundred years. A masterful mix of history, geography, anthropology, and the science of navigation, Sea People is a vivid tour of one of the most captivating regions in the world.
Author : Christina Thompson
Edition : Harper Collins, Paperback, 384 pages
ISBN : 9780008339050
A fascinating guide to Britain’s rock lighthouses passionately brought to life by Tom Nancollas. A book to leave you in awe of the natural world and the ingenuity of humankind.
Author : Tom Nancollas
Edition : Penguin Books, Hardback / Paperback, 256 pages
ISBN : 9781846149375 / 9781846149382
*WINNER* of the Saltire First Book of the Year 2019
Longlisted for the Highland Book Prize 2019
The British Isles are remarkable for their extraordinary seabird life: spectacular gatherings of charismatic Arctic terns, elegant fulmars and stoic eiders, to name just a few. Often found in the most remote and dramatic reaches of our shores, these colonies are landscapes shaped not by us but by the birds.
In 2015, Stephen Rutt escaped his hectic, anxiety-inducing life in London for the bird observatory on North Ronaldsay, the most northerly of the Orkney Islands. In thrall to these windswept havens and the people and birds that inhabit them, he began a journey to the edges of Britain. From Shetland, to the Farnes of Northumberland, down to the Welsh islands off the Pembrokeshire coast, he explores the part seabirds have played in our history and what they continue to mean to Britain today.
The Seafarers is the story of those travels: a love letter, written from the rocks and the edges, for the salt-stained, isolated and ever-changing lives of seabirds. This beguiling book reveals what it feels like to be immersed in a completely wild landscape, examining the allure of the remote in an over-crowded world.
Author : Stephen Rutt
Edition : Elliott & Thompson Limited, Paperback, 288 pages
ISBN : 9781783965045
Weight: 290g
Dimensions: 129 x 198 x 23mm
Travel writing to inspire. Love of Country is Bunting’s tales of her travels in the Hebrides, exploring wild nature and history.
Author : Madeleine Bunting
Edition : Granta Books, paperback, 368 pages
ISBN : 9781847085184
In a world of Google Earth, in which it is easy to believe that every discovery has been made and every adventure already had, Off the Map is a stunning testament to how mysterious our planet still is.
From forgotten enclaves to floating islands, from hidden villages to New York gutter spaces, Off the Map charts the hidden corners of our planet. And while these are not necessarily places you would choose to visit on holiday - Hobyo, the pirate capital of Somalia, or Zheleznogorsk, a secret military town in Russia - they each carry a story about the strangeness of place and our need for a geography that understands our hunger for the fantastic and the unexpected.
But it also shows us that topophilia, the love of place, is a fundamental part of what it is to be human. Whether you are an urban explorer or an armchair traveller, Off the Map will inspire and enchant. You'll never look at a map in quite the same way again.
Author : Alastair Bonnett
Edition : Aurum Press, Paperback, 320 pages
ISBN : 9781781313619
Geography is getting stranger. Out there, fleets of new islands are under construction and micro-nations are struggling into the light. As new borders and boundaries ebb and flow with increasing speed, it feels as if our old maps are being discarded, redrawn or torn up.
Alastair Bonnett uncovers the stories of thirty-nine extraordinary places, each of which challenges us to re-imagine the world around us. From emerging islands, disruptive enclaves and bold utopian visions to uncanny ruins, ghostly tunnels and hidden landscapes - these are destinations that lie beyond ordinary coordinates.
A follow on from the critically acclaimed Off the Map, this is a timely and fascinating discussion of place, ownership and ideas of state.
Author : Alastair Bonnett
Edition : Aurum Press, Paperback, 304 pages
ISBN : 9781781318034
'Thus fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself.’
Who has not dreamed of life on an exotic isle, far away from civilisation? Here is the novel which has inspired countless imitations by lesser writers, none of which equal the power and originality of Defoe's famous book. Robinson Crusoe, set ashore on an island after a terrible storm at sea, is forced to make do with only a knife, some tobacco, and a pipe. He learns how to build a canoe, make bread, and endure endless solitude. That is, until, twenty-four years later, when he confronts another human being. First published in 1719, Robinson Crusoe has been praised by such writers as James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, and Samuel Johnson as one of the greatest novels in the English language.
Why Novel North recommends
'Based on the real life Scottish castaway Alexander Selkirk, Robinson Crusoe is rich in detail and believable. It’s both considered and insightful, and reflects the contemplations of those of us who’ve pondered how we would survive marooned on an island. It rightly deserves its consideration as one of the most the famous adventure stories written.'
Author : Daniel Defoe
Edition : Penguin Clothbound Classic, Hardback, 288 pages
ISBN : 9780141393407
Weight: 403g
Dimensions: 204 x 138 x 29mm
'Seaward ho! Hang the treasure! It's the glory of the sea that has turned my head.'
Following the demise of bloodthirsty buccaneer Captain Flint, young Jim Hawkins finds himself with the key to a fortune. For he has discovered a map that will lead him to the fabled Treasure Island. But a host of villains, wild beasts and deadly savages stand between him and the stash of gold. Not to mention the most infamous pirate ever to sail the high seas . . .
Why Novel North recommends
‘Sinister, exciting and above all adventurous, Treasure Island is swashbuckling tale of complex characters and questionable motives. It’s perfect if you are drawn to stories ‘x marks the spot’ and setting out on quests of discovery.’
Author : Robert Louis Stevenson
Edition : Penguin Clothbound Classic, Hardback, 240 pages
ISBN : 9780141192451
Weight: 354g
Dimensions: 204 x 138 x 25mm
'There's the Black Island. Only a few minutes and we'll be ashore.'
Witnessing a mysterious plane crash, Tintin embarks on a grand adventure which takes him to the highlands of Scotland and a castle home to an unexpected resident.
Why Novel North recommends
'A childhood favourite, with great Snowy (the dog) escapades.'
Author : Hergé
Edition : Egmont, Hardback, 64 pages
ISBN : 9781405208062
Weight: 460g
Dimensions: 301 x 224 x 9mm
Nix has spent her entire life aboard her father’s ship, sailing across the centuries, across the world, across myth and imagination. As long as her father has a map for it, he can sail to any time, any place, real or imagined: nineteenth-century China, the land from One Thousand and One Nights, a mythic version of Africa. Along the way they have found crewmates and friends, and even a disarming thief who could come to mean much more to Nix.
But the end to it all looms closer every day.
Her father is obsessed with obtaining the one map, 1868 Honolulu, that could take him back to his lost love, Nix’s mother. Even though getting it—and going there—could erase Nix’s very existence.
Author : Heidi Heilig
Edition : Hot Key Books, Paperback, 368 pages
ISBN : 9781471406652
Weight: 293g
Dimensions: 198 x 129 x 22mm
The Walker children - also known as Captain John, Mate Susan, Able-Seaman Titty, and Ship's Boy Roger - set sail on the Swallow and head for Wild Cat Island. There they camp under open skies, swim in clear water and go fishing for their dinner. But their days are disturbed by the Blackett sisters, the fierce Amazon pirates. The Swallows and Amazons decide to battle it out, and so begins a summer of unforgettable discoveries and incredible adventures.
Author : Arthur Ransome
Edition : Vintage Children’s Classics, Paperback, 528 pages
ISBN : 9780099572794
Weight: 344g
Dimensions: 188 x 129 x 31mm