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2000s: Trying to run from yourself on the ragged and remote Faroe Islands may not be an easy thing to do. But isn’t an island a good place to hide? Not when there is no escape…
The Last Refuge
What you need to know before your trail
What would your last refuge be? What if you were trying to run from your past, would you try to start again on a remote island thinking that here no one knows your name or your early life?
John Callum desperately needs and wants a new start and at first he is welcomed into the small community. but inside his head, the nightmares still keep him awake at night.
Then peace really does shatter the calm scene – for murder comes to the island and the police from Copenhagen to investigate. John has to watch his own back. Away from the investigation, police questions and overall suspicion, John’s nightmares are getting worse and a lot more disturbing. Could they be trying to tell him something of the murder?
Travel Guide
You would think that the Faroe islands would be a good place to hide. There are eighteen islands in total and they are all windswept with a wild and rugged setting. Located off the west coast of Scotland, and half way between Iceland and Norway, they are not your usual literary setting, but here they both beautiful and deadly.
“It could have been the definition of the middle of nowhere”
These are the new surroundings of John who is escaping his Glasgow past. “I was blown into the Faroe Island on the June Wind” Not everyone is welcoming however and suspicion soon grows of this outsider, this stranger from Scotland. The setting is a character in this novel of suspicion and distrust -for an outsider can be blamed for most things and when a murder takes place and he was one of the last ones to talk to him, the finger does not only point but stab as well. the police from Copenhagen are another outsider to this place of legend –
“The giants in Iceland were jealous of the Faroes and wanted the islands for themselves”
For John, who wants to escape, the remote and isolation provides little comfort or safe haven.His nightmares get worse and more vivid and the islands prove to be an unwelcome enemy too for their long winters, dark days and inhospitable welcome prove to be as raw as they can be. When your mind is so troubled that not even sleep brings you relief, this is a bad place to be. The city of Torshavn with its western harbour at Undir Bryggjubakka is described as merely haunting and another blow to John’s troubled mind –
“The smells of the sea – salt and seaweed and a faint whiff of oil came to me on the breeze of that knowledge and I slowly turned to see it lapping blackly behind me, white boats bobbing and oblivious to whatever plight I faced.”
Visceral, raw, evocative and a good tour of the Faroe islands and the beauty and torture they bring to one man.
Booktrail Boarding Pass Information:
Twitter: @craigrobertson_
Web: craigrobertsonbooks.co.uk
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