Lost Island
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- £6.99
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- £6.99
Publisher Description
LOST ISLAND was Barbara Follett's third and last novel. It tells the story of Jane Carey, a young woman from Maine whose character and philosophy bear a striking similarity to her creator's.
A lover of woods and mountains, Jane finds herself working in a dusty New York office during the early years of the Great Depression. Her job is dull, her friends are in trouble, and she yearns for adventure. She finds it in a schooner anchored in the harbor, which soon whisks her away to… where? Jane doesn't know nor care.
Jane and second mate Davidson fall in love; and when the ship is wrecked during a mighty storm, they find paradise on an uncharted island in the South Pacific. Years pass, until the modern world resurfaces with its teeth bared, forcing the couple to deal with their new, heartbreaking reality.
Barbara's earlier novels--THE HOUSE WITHOUT WINDOWS and THE VOYAGE OF THE NORMAN D.--were published by Alfred A. Knopf when she was twelve and thirteen. Her literary career looked bright, but after her father deserted his family in 1928 her world fell apart. A fearless girl, Barbara managed her grief by cutting a new path--one full of adventure, wisdom, and love.
LOST ISLAND mirrors the lives of its author and Edward Anderson, a sailor she met at sea in 1929. Five years after finishing it, on December 7, 1939, Barbara walked out of her home in Brookline, Massachusetts, and was not heard from again. She was twenty-five.
This expanded edition includes three other stories by Barbara--ROCKS, TRAVELS WITHOUT A DONKEY, AND WALKING THE MALLORCAN COAST--and an afterword by her half-nephew, Stefan Cooke, whose BARBARA NEWHALL FOLLETT: A LIFE IN LETTERS was published by Farksolia in 2015.
Customer Reviews
Essential reading for anyone wanting to know more about Barbara Newhall Follett
Barbara Newhall Follett was a child prodigy and author of The House Without Windows which was widely acclaimed in the 1920's.
Her second claim to fame is her sudden and mysterious disappearance around 1940.
This book hosts her unpublished tale of the Lost Island together with an explanatory 'Afterword' by a descendant of Barbara's father.
Both the House Without Windows and Lost Island are extremely descriptive of nature and the beauty of the natural world but also somewhat autobiographical and perhaps even prophetic of Barbara's future.
Lost Island is a tale of a young secretary in New York who goes in search of adventure and finds love following a shipwreck and several years as a castaway with her only surviving shipmate.
Life becomes more complicated when she is rescued and returned to New York. Her previous love interest is supplanted by a more tangible companion with shared interests and lightness of spirit.
But she does not marry her second love and the final chapter concludes on a somewhat strange philosophical tone which may be prophetic or perhaps an indication of her state of mind. In real life she did marry her second love but it ended tragically.
The 'Afterword' explains the biographical connection between the story and her life drawing on her letters and also reaches a somewhat sad conclusion on her disappearance and death. Given Barbara's attributes one might have expected her to embark on some new and different foreign adventure and then live happily ever after.
The book also contains 3 appendices on her trekking adventures in the mountains and lakes of Maine and on the coast of Mallorca. These are a lively recounting of Barbara's journeys and restore the spirits after the sad conclusion of the Afterword. If you are an outdoor type you may even find yourself following along on a trail map.