Far Afield

Even though there are a couple of minor factual errors in the book I really enjoyed reading about my country and my neighbour village with the eyes of Jonathan. To me this is an important piece of history. Of course there are books in Faroese language describing this period (late 60's early 70's) - but this visitors' viewpoint really pinpoints the very soul of this tiny population. And by the way - Jonathan is not fictional. There really was an american by that name living in Skopun at that time. I know - he is not forgotten by his fellow villagers.

Jonathan sets forth from academia to apply his anthropological skills to the folks ways of the Faroe Islands. What ensues can best be described by the phrase "a duck out of water". Jonathan, who from the heights of his greater learning expects to note and judge "folk" behavior, survives his time in the field only because the good folks of the Islands take pity on him and take care of him - a fact to which he remains oblivious to the day he leaves. The writer approaches her subject with great wit and underlying compassion. When my book group read this book, it received a widely varied reaction. A year later, they still talk of this book and those who initially did not care for it find themselves more and more under it's spell. What is talked about a year later? The food (puffins and other delicacies). Fresh meat and sheep in the kitchen. The horrors of "stirring". A growing taste for Aqua Vit. The Danish girl. Definitely a book to read. You will never ever forget the Faroe Islands

OK, so Jonathan is 25 and should already have come of age, but as the only child of 2 professors, he has led the privileged, sheltered Eastern private-school life. So to watch him progress from emotionally detached, hyper-self-critical, pizza-eating Bostonite to a better self (you read the novel - let's just say there is whale blubber instead of pizza) over the course of his year on the Faroe Islands is a joy. A wonderful setting, humor, a great cast of characters, superb writing and an unforgetable young man in a book that I wish had a sequel.

This is a gem of a book, with wonderful writing and characters and a sense of humor that is delightful. And how often do you get a chance to read a novel set in the Faroe Islands? I am very involved with American Field Service(AFS) exchange programs, and I often recommend this book to Americans going abroad as well as students spending the year in the US, as it is so sensitive to issues of culture and "strangers in a strange land"... It works on so many levels. If you like "The Shipping News", you'll love "Far Afield."

Johnathan, a graduate anthropology student, undertakes a new life on the remote Faroes--a near arctic archipelago southeast of Iceland. In this culturally alien setting, he cuts his teeth on myriad folk encounters, from supernatural to prosaic. Besieged by interminable frustration, he slowly learns--at the pace of continental drift--to accept life as it comes. Johnathan's foibles strike universal chords, thus transporting us into his story. Plus, he's great to laugh at. Never satisfied, he worries himself silly. Kaysen's lucid style telescoped me into Johnathan's vivid psychological world, and delighted me many times over with a smorgasbord of delicious surprises. I only give it a nine because I just finished; I need time to fully digest its substantial rewards before I could say that it's perfect. But, it may very well be