Synopses & Reviews
In 1937, Adam Nicolson's father answered a newspaper ad—"Uninhabited islands for sale. Outer Hebrides, 600 acres. . . . Puffins and seals. Apply."—and thus found the Shiants. With a name meaning "holy or enchanted islands," the Shiants for millennia were a haven for those seeking solitude, but their rich, sometimes violent history of human habitation includes much more. When he was twenty-one, Nicolson inherited this almost indescribably beautiful property: a landscape, soaked in centuries-old tales of restless ghosts and Bronze Age gold, that cradles the heritage of a once-vibrant world of farmers and fishermen.
In Sea Room, Nicolson describes and relives his love affair with the three tiny islands and their strange and colorful history in passionate, keenly precise prose—sharing with us the greatest gift an island bestows on its inhabitants: a deep engagement with the natural world.
Review
“Nicolsons chronicle is a fine book...Readers will be duly awed by his delicately layered story.” Erica Sanders, New York Times Book Review
Synopsis
"No other book has given me as rich a sense of what makes a small island so revelatory of our life on earth." --David Craig, "London Review of Books"
In 1937, Adam Nicolson's father answered a newspaper ad--"Uninhabited islands for sale. Outer Hebrides, 600 acres . . . Puffins and seals. Apply . . ." In this radiant and powerful book, Adam describes, and relives, his love affair with these breathtakingly beautiful islands called the Shiants. Crowned with huge cliffs of black basalt and surrounded by tidal rips, they are wild, dangerous, and dramatic--with a long, haunting past. "Sea Room" celebrates this extraordinary place and shares with us the greatest gift an island can bestow: intimate and profound engagement with the natural world.
About the Author
Adam Nicols on is the author of Seamanship, God's Secretaries, and Seize the Fire. He has won both the Somerset Maugham and William Heinemann awards, and he lives with his family at Sissinghurst Castle in England.