Search results for ""Author Robin Lloyd""

William Hutchison Murray (1913 - 1996) was one of Scotland's most distinguished climbers in the years before and after the Second World War. As a prisoner of war in Italy he wrote his first classic book, Mountaineering in Scotland, on rough toilet paper which was confiscated and destroyed by the Gestapo. The rewritten version was published in 1947 and followed by the, now, equally famous, Undiscovered Scotland. In 1951 he was depute leader to Eric Shipton on the Everest Reconnaissance Expedition. In later years he became a successful novelist and pioneer conservationist.

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Harbor of Spies is an historical novel set in Havana in 1863 during the American Civil War, when the Spanish colonial city was alive with intrigue and war related espionage. The protagonist - a young American ship captain named Everett Townsend - is pulled into the war, not as a Naval officer, as he had once hoped, but as the captain of a blockade-running schooner. The rescue of a man outside Havana harbor sets in motion a plot where Townsend finds himself trapped by circumstances beyond his control. He soon realizes how this good deed has put his own life in danger, entangling him in a sensitive murder investigation. Townsend is forced to work for a profiteering Spanish merchant who introduces him to a world of spies, blockade runners, and slave traders. As a foreigner and an outsider in Cuba, he struggles to maintain his own sense of identity. As he grapples with the uncertain moral terrain he finds in Havana, Townsend becomes ever more involved with the mystery surrounding the murder. Even at sea, where his ship-handling skills are put to the ultimate test against the Navy’s powerful gunships, he finds he is unable to avoid reminders about the unsolved murder of a top English diplomat. From the bars, to the docks, to the dance halls, Townsend’s path moves from colonial Havana to the slave plantations in the interior. There amid the harsh cruelty he discovers in the Cuban countryside, he unexpectedly begins to unravel a family mystery. Together with the daughter of an American innkeeper in Havana he confronts the veiled, dangerous forces he finds on the island. The novel is a richly drawn portrait of Spanish colonial Havana at a time when the city was flush with sugar wealth and filled with signs of the American Civil War. It is a realistic look at Cuba’s role in the war, and the importance of the scores of blockade running ships- both sail and steam- that ran the gauntlet of the Union blockade from Havana into the Gulf of Mexico.

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Lyme, Connecticut, early nineteenth century. Elisha Ely Morgan is a young farm boy who has witnessed firsthand the terror of the War of 1812. Troubled by a tumultuous home life ruled by the fists of their tempestuous father, Ely's two older brothers have both left their pastoral boyhoods to seek manhood through sailing. One afternoon, the Morgan family receives a letter with the news that one brother is lost at sea; the other is believed to be dead. Scrimping as much savings as a farm boy can muster, Ely spends nearly every penny he has to become a sailor on a square-rigged ship, on a route from New York to London—a route he hopes will lead to his vanished brother, Abraham. Learning the brutal trade of a sailor, Ely takes quickly to sea-life, but his focus lies with finding Abraham. Following a series of cryptic clues regarding his brother's fate, Ely becomes entrenched in a mystery deeper than he can imagine. As he feels himself drawing closer to an answer, Ely climbs the ranks to become a captain, experiences romance, faces a mutiny, meets Queen Victoria, and befriends historical legends such as Charles Dickens in his raucous quest.

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Robin Lloyd-Jones has been exploring the west coast and islands of Scotland in his sea kayak for more than forty years. In this book he recalls many a memorable expedition to wild and beautiful shores. Amongst magnificent scenery and ever-changing seas, we are transported to Jura, Scarba, the Garvellach Isles, Mull, Staffa, the Treshnish Isles, the Monach Isles, Iona, Lewis and the Uists, Skye, the Orkneys, and the Shetland Isles. Along the way, he explains a great deal about kayaking, about the wildlife and history of the areas he visits. More than that, however, he makes us feel that we are with him in his kayak. Through his vivid and beautifully crafted prose, we experience the terror of a force nine gale, the tranquillity of moonlit trips, and the lure of tiny bays and seal-meadows accessible only to a slim kayak. We encounter dolphins, otters, unidentified monsters and nuclear submarines. This is a book to set the imagination adrift and appeal to the Robinson Crusoe in all of us; a book for those seeking wider horizons, be their vessel an armchair or a kayak.

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Turreted fairytale peaks, glistening snowfields, waterfalls plunging over immense cliffs into the sea, a million tons of ice capsizing - this is the setting for "Fallen Pieces of the Moon", an account of a kayak trip along the west coast of Greenland, paddling about 150 miles of coastline in the Nuuk fjords area. Into the day-to-day account of contending with unsettled weather such as fog, unstable icebergs, midges and bugs by the billion, are woven insights into Inuit culture - their language, their shamanic practices, their hunting and navigation techniques and much more. On the way, the reader learns a great deal about the Arctic animals, pollution and the Arctic environment. Information on the early Arctic whalers, when whole fleets were beset and crushed by ice, is included; and an appreciation will be gained of the hardships endured by the Viking settlers and explorers such as Frobisher and Franklin who suffered scurvy, frostbite and starvation. Told with humour, the book is endlessly informative and entertaining on topics ranging from cannibalism, kayak rolling and Inuit string games to cargo cults or how the invention of bully beef influenced naval tactics." Fallen Pieces of the Moon" is a celebration of a sparse, billion-year-old landscape where the roots of things, both physical and human, seem less hidden. It conveys something of the wonder and awe that Greenland inspires in all who have been there. It describes days of absolute stillness, sliding though shoals of waxing suns; ephemeral cloudscapes on broad-winged breezes; a high corrie where jet black ravens float in a crystal bowl of Alpine air; and the ever-present icebergs like cathedrals of glass, like floating jewels, like fallen pieces of the moon.

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The west coast of Scotland casts a spell on anyone with a taste for adventure, a feeling for the past or a love of the wild, uninhabited places. With tidal currents of awesome power running between fascinating patterns of islands, it is a challenging place for any type of small craft. Robin Lloyd-Jones has been exploring here in his sea kayak for more than forty years.In this enchanced new edition of Argonauts of the Western Isles he takes us on many a memorable epedition to wild and beautiful shores. Amongst magnificent scenery and ever-changing seas, we are transported to Jura, Scarba, the Garvellach Isles, Mull, Staffa, the Treshnish Isles, the Monack Isles, Iona, Lewis and the Utis, Skye, the Orkneys, the Shetland Isles to places with music in their names, like Tir Nan Og the land of the ever-young, places which, once visited, become part of you.Along the way the author tells us a great deal about kayaking, about the wildlife and the history of the area but, more than that, he makes us feel that we are with him on his kayak.We experience what it is like to set out with one's destination below the horizon and nothing but open sea ahead, to bivouac under the stars, to spend the night aboard a wreck, to be 'hunted' by the vortex of the Corryvreckan whirlpool, to paddle into dark, booming caves, to feel an Atlantic swell rolling beneath the kayak and to become part of its rhythm. Through the author's vivid descriptions we know the terror of a force nine gale, the tranquillity of moolit trips, and the lure of tiny bays and seal-meadows accessible only to a slim kayak. We encounter dolphins, otters, unidentified monsters and nuclear submarines. And when he writes of the magic of remote islands, the Robinson Crusoe in all of us is awakened.This is a book to set the imagination adrift, a book for those seeking wider horizons, be their vessel an armchair or a kayak.

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Robin Lloyd’s debut novel opens in Lyme, Connecticut, in the early nineteenth century. Elisha Ely Morgan is a young farm boy who has witnessed firsthand the terror of the War of 1812. Troubled by a tumultuous home life ruled by the fists of their tempestuous father, Ely's two older brothers have both left their pastoral boyhoods to seek manhood through sailing. One afternoon, the Morgan family receives a letter with the news that one brother is lost at sea; the other is believed to be dead. Scrimping as much savings as a farm boy can muster, Ely spends nearly every penny he has to become a sailor on a square-rigged ship, on a route from New York to London—a route he hopes will lead to his vanished brother, Abraham. Learning the brutal trade of a sailor, Ely takes quickly to sea-life, but his focus lies with finding Abraham. Following a series of cryptic clues regarding his brother's fate, Ely becomes entrenched in a mystery deeper than he can imagine. As he feels himself drawing closer to an answer, Ely climbs the ranks to become a captain, experiences romance, faces a mutiny, meets Queen Victoria, and befriends historical legends such as Charles Dickens in his raucous quest.

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