Posie Graeme-Evans is a favorite author of mine. She wrote a trilogy about a girl named Anne who has an affair with King Edward the IV in fifteenth century England, and it is amazing. (The Innocent, The Exiled, and The Uncrowned Queen) The Island House is one of her four stand alone books, a dual timeline story set on an old Scottish island which has more history than the beach has sand. And Posie tells us a tiny bit about that history, taking us all the way back to AD 800, a time of Viking raids and superstition and warring religions where a young girl must try to survive any way she can, even if her Pictish views don't meet with the young Viking warrior she falls for. In current times, a woman studying archaeology is poised to also dig into her father's similar work in a place she has never visited and finds foreign. What she uncovers (ahem) will help us to link the present to the past, revealing some secrets while leaving others forever obscured.
If you like historical fiction a la Susanna Kearsley and Phillipa Gregory, this book is right up your alley. It took a while for me to see a connection beyond location, but the stories of these two women separated by centuries are more than enough to stand on their own. Be prepared for some violent behavior (hello, Vikings!) and Scottish weather and boats and handsome hunks too. Also, for some excellent and beautifully descriptive writing! I have one more book to read and I will be a PGE completist!
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