From the No.1 bestselling author of The Shepherd's Life, a spellbinding story of friendship, history and redemption on a remote Norwegian island
We are all in need of lights to follow.

One afternoon many years ago, James Rebanks met an old woman on a remote Norwegian island. She lived and worked alone on a tiny rocky outcrop, caring for wild Eider ducks and gathering their down. Hers was a centuries-old trade that had once made men and women rich, but had long been in decline. Still, somehow, she seemed to be hanging on.

Back at home, Rebanks couldn't stop thinking about the woman on the rocks. She was fierce and otherworldly - and yet strangely familiar. Years passed. Then, one day, he wrote her a letter, asking if he could return. Bring work clothes, she replied, and good boots, and come quickly: her health was failing. And so he travelled to the edge of the Arctic to witness her last season on the island.

This is the story of that season. It is the story of a unique and ancient landscape, and of the woman who brought it back to life. It traces the pattern of her work from the rough, isolated toil of bitter winter, to the elation of the endless summer light, when the birds leave behind their precious down for gathering, like feathered gold.

Slowly, Rebanks begins to understand that this woman and her world are not what he had previously thought. What began as a journey of escape becomes an extraordinary lesson in self-knowledge and forgiveness.

About the Author
James Rebanks is a farmer and writer based in the Lake District. His No. 1 bestselling debut, The Shepherd's Life, was translated into sixteen languages. His second book, English Pastoral, was also a Top Ten bestseller and was named the Sunday Times Nature Book of the Year.

Reviews
Humane, beautifully paced, gentle, and strangely compelling, The Place of Tides feels like, not only a modern classic, but one we very much need right now -- George Saunders
A magnificent book -- wonderfully unlike any other. The Place of Tides is big-hearted and transporting, a quietly gripping reckoning with self-sufficiency and interdependence, with the lives that make us and the lives that we make. I didn't want it to end, and I can't wait to reread it -- Philip Gourevitch
James Rebanks has done a miraculous thing. He takes the reader with him to a stark, remote island on the strangest mission in the toughest circumstances and makes you feel like you're coming home. A profound, transformative, uplifting story -- Isabella Tree
The Place of Tides is a magical book, at once a lament for a world in danger of disappearing, and a celebration of an indomitable spirit determined to preserve it. James Rebanks has written a quiet yet ringing masterpiece. -- John Banville
The Place of Tides is terrific - so honest and strange. It's somehow about eider ducks, middle age, one woman's breathtaking skill and determination, the collapse of the natural order and everything in between. I think it's Rebanks' best book yet -- Sam Knight
The Place of Tides is a captivating portrait of a younger man learning from an older woman, of the great buzzing jungle of the modern world versus the silent wisdom of old ways, of paying attention to your heart instead of the internet, of finding out how to go your own way. It is a revelation about another way of living, long past, but now revived. But what really strikes is the emotional profundity. Rebanks lays himself open, as a man in need of redemption, who finds solace in the remotest of places, and with the most unexpected of people: a Scandinavian duck woman in her seventies. The book will stand as one of the great portraits of a wise, courageous and indomitable woman written in tribute by a grateful man -- Laura Cumming
Deceptively simple, emotionally surprising, beautiful, and true -- Melissa Harrison
A fable-like tale, as beautiful and elusive as the idea of home and self it seeks to recover -- Richard Flanagan
Deeply felt and moving ... the friendship in the book is hard won, and all the more beautiful for that. It is the most inspiring book I've read for years -- Jenny Linford
An extraordinary story, gently told. This was just the book I needed -- Nigel Slater
This is utterly engaging storytelling. The drama, the change, the mystery, the unknown; the details of nature, the moods, the hope and despair; the memories, reflections and learning that emerge out of long lives lived fully: The Place of Tides tells a beautiful story that is profound and moving -- Jane Clarke
The Place of Tides is all that I want from a story: poetic, true and full of feeling -- Marcus Mumford
A love letter to the quiet and complex majesty of a little-known landscape and the women that tirelessly tend to it. It moved, humbled and educated me and made a place I have never set my eyes on suddenly vivid and close -- Vanessa Kisuule
A charismatic portrait of fidelity and the true meaning of home -- Nick Offerman
A vivid portrayal of the fascinating world of the duck women of Norway's Helgeland islands -- Tim Pears
What a strange, enchanting book ... Rebanks writes of his season with the duck women with elegance, acuity and a rare tenderness ... the story is like a fairy tale; timeless except for the occasional intrusion of an outboard engine * Times Literary Suplement *



Book Information
ISBN 9780241426937
Author James Rebanks
Format Hardback
Page Count 304
Imprint Allen Lane
Publisher Penguin Books Ltd
Weight(grams) 408g
Dimensions(mm) 223mm * 147mm * 28mm