Jack's Island by Norman Jorgensen

Jack's Island (2008,
Fremantle Press)

This book takes the reader back in history to World War II. The protagonist, Jack, lives with his family on Rottnest Island off the coast of Western Australia. The novel is really a loosely connected collection of anecdotes and stories about Jack and his friends. One adventure after another build to form a cohesive narrative that is both engaging and insightful. Jorgensen has shown the 'rough and tumble' ways of childhood that would seem outrageously dangerous nowadays to modern parents.
   The author has a gentle, easy-going style but doesn't shy away from issues of prejudice and snobbery. I enjoyed this book as a lighthearted record of life during the war years. It's suitable for 8-12 year olds, and those interested in history.

The Island of the Colour-blind by Oliver Sacks

The Island of the Colour-blind
 (Picador, 1996)

Oliver Sacks is a neurologist and author who writes about the most peculiar and intriguing neurological conditions. A few years ago I read the autobiographical account of his childhood, Uncle Tungsten, and was thoroughly engrossed by his insatiable curiosity and his passion for science. The Island of the Colour-blind is an account of his travels in the Federated States of Micronesia (one of my favourite places in the Pacific). The book is set out in two parts. The first deals with the issue of colour-blindness. Apparently on Pingelap, an outlying islands of Pohnpei there is an unusually high number of people who see no colour at all, a condition known as achromotopia. Sacks travelled to Pingelap with two colleagues, one of whom was achromatopic, and together they recorded the incidence of the disorder and gave out sunglasses and other visual aids. People with this condition find direct sunlight blinding. They squint and find it difficult to see small details. They have excellent night vision, however.
   The second half of this book was to do with a rare neurological disorder, called lytico-bodig, that occurs on Guam, an island which is part of the Marianas Islands. The disease causes Parkinsonism type symptoms in some families and motor neurone disease in others. No one knows the exact cause of the condition although some researchers speculate it could be to do with the islanders eating the seeds of the cycad plants which are endemic to the island. The seeds are toxic and need to be specially prepared before they are eaten. However, other researchers have disputed this hypothesis and think there may be a viral cause. Although no conclusions were reached the book examines all the theories and gives detailed accounts of the disease in many patients.
   This book is fascinating reading for science students. Sacks manages to keep the medical jargon to a minimum and there are dozens of footnotes and references to his readings in this field. This book would be ideal to include as a non-fiction title for the PSSC English curriculum.

The Madman's Daughter by Megan Shepherd

Many years ago I read the classic horror tale by H.G. Wells, The Island of Doctor Moreau. Full of monsters made from animal experiments, the story is gruesome, Gothic and grotesque. Megan Shepherd's novel, The Madman's Daughter, is a terrific piece of fan fiction that gives this old tale a fresh platform. It is the story of sixteen year old Juliet Moreau, the only child of the eccentric but brilliant surgeon, Doctor Moreau. Her father fled London six years earlier after rumours of his barbaric methods began to circulate. With her mother now dead, Juliet is determined to search for her father. She travels by ship to her father's island and along the way rekindles a friendship with her father's young servant, now grown into a handsome young man named Montgomery. The ship takes on a castaway, a brooding gentleman called Edward who reveals little about his past.

The Madman's Daughter
(HarperVoyager, 2013).

   Once on the island Juliet receives a tepid-reception but the mad doctor tries to murder the stranger, Edward. Montgomery rescues him but the two young men become rivals over Juliet's attention. As the weeks go by, Juliet finds herself embroiled in the horror of her father's experiments and she resolves to escape the island. And somewhere lurking in the jungle, a beast has begun to kill the villagers and threatens to attack the doctor's compound.
   Shepherd's prose was serviceable but repetitious, and littered with misplaced modifiers and cliches, suggesting some further line editing was needed. I found this novel a bit slow at the beginning and Juliet's character was difficult to empathise with in a Victorian London setting. However her feisty temperament fits in well with the predicament she finds herself in on the isolated Pacific island. Still, my desire to read on to when they reached the island kept me reading. As soon as Doctor Moreau was revealed on the page, the story took off. The plotting was tremendous, with intricate twists and some nasty surprises in the final few pages.
 
A cracker of a story for those who like a touch of the supernatural.

Robert Louis Stevenson: His Best Pacific Writings, compiled by Roger Robinson

Robert Louis Stevenson: His Best Pacific Writings
(UQP, 2004)

This anthology is interesting because it documents customs, characters and politics of many Pacific Islands from a historical perspective.  I always thought he'd only visited Tahiti and then settled in Samoa, but he also spent time in the Marquesas, Kiribati and New Caledonia, and spent countless weeks rolling around on boats between islands. This anthology contains Stevenson's essays, poems and short stories all about the Pacific Islands. Much of his essays are densely written and a little hard to follow, due to the old fashioned style of prose. I found the 'Battle on the Beach' and 'The Hurricane' particularly difficult to fathom but his short stories are delightful. There are prayers and poems at the end which are also moving. His essays about the leper colony and secondly his Gilbertese friends were fascinating. This book gives great insight into the character of Stevenson. He a great listener and loved to mix with islanders and learn from their oral traditions.

The Mountain by Drusilla Modjeska

The Mountain
(Vintage Books, 2012) 

It's taken me over a week to read this book, which is partly due to the dense content held in 400 plus pages and partly due to my study commitments. When I put it down this morning I was emotionally exhausted. The book deals with expatriate and islander relationships, Pacific art, politics, spiritual beliefs and environmentalism. Set in Papua New Guinea prior to independence it captures the idealism and vibrancy of young intellectuals keen to shake off the shackles of colonialism. At its base is a love story between Dutch photographer Rika and young political activist Aaron, a saltwater man from the Collingwood Bay area. Rika's desire to have a child with Aaron fuels much of the misunderstandings between the two cultures. Simmering in the background is the ever-present threat of sorcery.
   I enjoyed this book despite the fact that it was too long. The pace slowed in the middle.
   The second half of the book is set thirty years later, in contemporary times. It follows the story of Jericho, the hapkas boy who was born on the mountain and later grew up in London with Rika's ex-husband, his natural father.
   Both perspectives were interesting and sensitively handled, but I can't help feeling it could have been chopped back somewhat. If you can cope with long, complicated story lines you may enjoy this one.

Pacific Island Style by Glenn Jowitt and Peter Shaw

I quite like watching the ABC program Grand Designs. It shows people with far too much money constructing impressive, innovative and sometimes beautiful (and sometimes rather ugly) homes in Britain. When I lived in the Solomons there were many beautiful buildings that i was priveledged to visit, many of them traditional. Pacific Island Style is a coffee book title that showcases traditional housing forms throughout the Pacific. There are chapters dedicated to different Island groups including the Solomon Islands. I was delighted to find a picture on page 47 of the St Martins Training Centre church in Guadalcanal, showing the intricate woven cane patterns in the church walling. Wow! I remember that place at Tenaru. I went to a couple of services there and my husband was a regular, being a student at the training centre.

Pacific Island Style (Lothian, 1999)

   This book is lovely to browse through. The photographs are mostly of buildings, but the people and their arts and crafts are also depicted. It has sparked my interest to visit the Cook Islands one day. I want to buy a tivaevae!

Taming frigate birds

Frigate bird stand, Meneng. Source: J. Temaki, 2013

When I lived in Nauru there were a few wooden stands by the beach which always had frigate birds perched on them. More frigate birds flew overhead or nearby above the ocean. Nauruan culture has a strong relationship with these birds of the sea. Nauruans tame the birds and tether them to the frame to attract more birds. My friend John Temaki has kindly allowed me to publish these pictures of tame frigate birds in Nauru. Thanks John!

Feeding frigate birds, Meneng. Source: J. Temaki, 2013

Ireland's Islands by Peter Somerville-Large

This coffee table book has some stunning pictures of wild-looking windswept rocky isles off the coast of Ireland. It was an entertaining read and I learnt about the pirate Grace O'Malley who used to have hide-outs on some of these islands. The book is divided into a few pages per island, giving a short history and even some geological information.

Ireland's Islands (Salamander Books, 2000)

   Some of the islands are still inhabited and a handful are home to speakers of the native tongue, long stamped out on the mainland. If you enjoy the BBC series Coast, then you'll find this an enjoyable read. The photographs are by David Lyons.
   (I found this copy in the library so please excuse the library sticker.)

Devil-Devil by G.W.Kent

In the tradition of Ann Kengalu's Murder on the Mataniko Bridge comes another crime story set in the Solomon Islands. Devil-Devil is a complicated story of custom killings, smuggling and power-struggles set mostly on the island of Malaita.
   The author, G.W. Kent, spent eight years in the Solomons working in education and broadcasting. It is obvious that he has a thorough understanding of Malaitan customs, particularly in the north of the island although this knowledge doesn't cover all of the archipelago. (His reference to sorting out a dispute in Isabel using bride price is a case in point). I was also a little bemused about how the detective could walk from north Malaita, straight through to Kwaio land without coming across other language groups such as the Kwa'rae.

Devil-Devil (Constable and
Robinson, 2011).

   Despite these shortcomings the plot keeps readers wondering how all these murders and the disappearance of an American could be related. There is plenty of action and tension and some violent scenes, but nothing too graphic.
   The story is set in 1960, fifteen years after WW2 and almost as many years to come till independence. Kent does his best to show the islanders' disdain for their colonial masters. The main detective Ben Kella is a Lau man and the only indigenous policeman to reach the rank of sergeant. He is an aofia, a custom man highly respected in his community. However he is considered by other islanders as a 'white blackfella', too educated to be a true islander, and too traditional to be accepted by the expats.
   Kent has managed to capture the curious intertwining of faith that is common in the Solomons. Not only does Ben Kella straddle both worlds of spiritual tradition, but the other protagonist, the plucky Catholic nun, also accepts the presence of the pagan spirit world.
   The familiar landmarks of the G. Club, Point Cruz wharf, Chinatown and the Fishing Village are all described well to those who know Honiara.
   I enjoyed reading this although the quality of the writing is below average. Adverbs a-plenty pepper each page and make many sentences unwieldy, slowing the pace. If you enjoy a good crime plot however, and can overlook the flowery prose then you will enjoy Devil-Devil.