Neil M. Gunn - Böcker

The Silver Darlings is a tale of lives hard won from a cruel sea and crueller landlords. It tells of strong young men and stronger women whose loves, fears and sorrows are set deep in a landscape of raw beauty and bleak reward. The dawning of the Herring Fisheries brought with it the hope of escape from the brutality of the Highland Clearances, and Neil Gunn's story paints a vivid picture of a community fighting against nature and history and refusing to be crushed.

Kenn returns to the Highlands of his youth, back to the river which has haunted his dreams since boyhood. Determined to walk all the way back to its source, Kenn embarks on a journey that will lead him deep into the wilderness of his own heart. Profound and moving, Highland River is a stirring tale of what is lost and what endures, and the unexpected ways we can be renewed.

'One of the most important Scottish writers of the twentieth century' TLSA beautiful celebration of Scottish malt whisky and the illustrious lands that produce itA classic since its original publication in 1935, Whisky and Scotland will enlighten and entertain all who delight in the amber spirit that evokes 'the world of hills and glens, of raging elements, of shelter, of divine ease'.Whisky and Scotland takes us on a journey through the Highlands of Scotland to uncover the traditional techniques whereby barley grains become liquid gold. Written by one of Scotland's most acclaimed early twentieth-century writers, Whisky and Scotland examines whisky history, production and tradition that remains unchanged after hundreds of years. Witty and informative, this is Neil M. Gunn's lyrical toast to uisge beatha, the Celtic 'water of life'.

Unlike most of Gunn’s novels, The Lost Chart is set in a city – the city of Glasgow and its sea approaches. The untypical choice of background for the story is not the only departure from Gunn’s usual approach to his novels. The book is also a thriller. The story unfolds in a social ambience of fear and speculation within which certain sinister political forces are at work. Nuclear war is a possibility, if not a certainty. Shipping executive Dermot Cameron gets involved in a street brawl, loses the chart of the approaches to a remote Hebridean island and finds himself in a tussle between the British Secret Service and a locally-based communist fifth-column. The plot turns almost exclusively on the date of a looming crisis, and the imminence of that date pervades the thoughts and feelings of those in conflict with a locally-based sinister and elusive enemy.This timeless work, from one of the most important writers of the twentieth century, has a remarkable relevance to the events of today. When it was written in 1949 there was an uneasiness in the West regarding changes to the ‘old order’ of society and the decline in certain moral standards and spiritual beliefs. Today the problems facing humanity have not changed. The threatening political situations in the Far East, Middle East and Eastern Europe and the concomitant danger of nuclear warfare are all too evident. Against such a background, the way of life on the remote Hebridean island depicted by the author has an almost irresistible appeal.

Neil M Gunn, one of Scotland’s most distinguished 20th century authors, wrote over a period of 30 years, starting in 1926 and ending in 1956 with his so-called spiritual autobiography The Atom of Delight. Two years before this he wrote his last novel, The Other Landscape, the setting being the east coast of Scotland’s most northerly mainland county. This provides the perfect backdrop – a fishing hotel and its English residents, the local ghillies who served them, and a solitary white house near the cliffs in which the occupant, a man from the South, lives alone.Add to this the Major, a retired military officer-cum-diplomat, who quickly shows himself to be an insensitive and overbearing man, disdainful of his fellows and aggressive towards those who challenge his views or show any form of disrespect towards him. His paternalistic behaviour towards the local community masks a contempt for it. Life in the hotel is lightened on a more mundane level by two incidents, both directly relating to the Major – a false alarm over a drowning incident and a fire in his bedroom, both of which end happily, but with a damaging loss of face for the Major and much amusement for the guests and staff at the hotel.Juxtaposed with the sporting life at the hotel, and in a subtle way connected to it, is the fate of the solitary and bereaved occupant of the white house. The shadow of death, both present and past, hangs over the house and blends with the palette of second sight and the strong phenomenon of ‘recurrence’, when patterns of events inexplicably repeat themselves. The reader is thus invited to consider the realities of life and death and the inherent tragedies that are contained within them, but in the end is presented with a glimpse of hope and renewal.

Horrific experiences of the blitz in wartime London and the spiritual bankruptcy of her lover and his Marxist acquaintances are seen through the eyes of Nan, a young Scotswoman, who has returned to her native Highlands to recover from a nervous breakdown. Her letters to her lover from the warm and friendly ambience of a widowed aunt's farmhouse reflect her innermost thoughts on the essence of being and the restorative effects of the quiet rhythm of country life. The shadows of the immediate past begin to recede, but her return to health is rudely interrupted by news of the brutal murder of a neighbouring crofter and the unsolicited attentions of a sinister stranger. The inevitable relapse brings her aunt, a practical and cultured woman, into contact with both lover and stranger and pits her optimistic, human and emotional approach to life against the theories and bleak logic of the two men. The recovery of the young woman brings aunt and niece even closer together in their understanding of life, but the final denouement, although imbued with hope, is inconclusive and leaves the reader to imagine the eventual outcome.This is a subtly thoughtful and gripping novel, written with all the power of a master hand. Although written over fifty years ago, the book has a strange relevance to today's events. The blight of terrorism, the dominance of consumerism in everyday life, the absence of a spiritual dimension in domestic affairs and fears of the harmful effects of globalisation on the freedom and development of small communities, are symptoms of an uneasiness with regard to world stability and the erosion of traditional values and beliefs.

A novel set in a Highland shooting lodge, where the focus is a hunt in a remote deer forest; but this is no ordinary thriller. A shooting lodge party of wealthy English people, a team of Highland stalkers, a legendary stag to be hunted and a background of glen and corrie, shrouded from time to time by impenetrable mist. A marvellous blend of ever-changing landscape - be it light and shadow, swift transitiions from light to half light, mist, rain, tones and flowing lines - contribute to the dramatic essence of the novel. Culture and personality clashes and mystery, which portent much deeper clashes between spiritual and material values, provide a vastly enjoyable read.

From this evocative title comes a powerful novel set in the city of Glasgow in 1939. This is indeed a bleak stage, and yet how does this title, with its implication of freedom and flight, meld with a depressed city at the outbreak of war? The main character, a journalist, finds that a glimpse of wild geese catalyses the development of his thinking on various levels - social, political and psychological. The contrast of urban and rural life, characteristically penetrating dialogue, remarkable insight, physical violence...all are included and take the reader on an absorbing and enlightening journey to the story's denouement. Another outstanding novel from the creative pen of Gunn.