Islanders

'...from the opening pages with their map of the islands which turns north and south upside down to reflect the orientation of the island worldview, the reader's conventional perspectives on peripheral cultures is destabilised, and resettled in a view from a rock perched far in the Atlantic, looking at Europe, Britain, and even Orkney and Shetland from a very different value-centre.' Douglas Gifford, A History of Scottish Women's Writing.

'...from the opening pages with their map of the islands which turns north and south upside down to reflect the orientation of the island worldview, the reader's conventional perspectives on peripheral cultures is destabilised, and resettled in a view from a rock perched far in the Atlantic, looking at Europe, Britain, and even Orkney and Shetland from a very different value-centre.' Douglas Gifford, A History of Scottish Women's Writing.

Margaret Elphinstone has published eight novels as well as short stories and poetry. Her fiction is mostly historical and is characterised by her portrayal of people on journeys to places on the edge - islands, frontiers - where cultures and ideas meet and evolve.