The Last Summer (The Wild Isle Series Book 1) by Karen Swan🥎

Synopsis
Summer on St Kilda – a wild, remote Scottish island.
Two strangers from drastically different worlds meet . . .

Wild-spirited Effie Gillies has lived all her life on the small island of St Kilda but when Lord Sholto, heir to the Earl of Dumfries, visits, the attraction between them is instant. For one glorious week she guides the handsome young visitor around the isle, falling in love for the first time – until a storm hits and her world falls apart.

Three months later, St Kilda falls silent as the islanders are evacuated for a better life on the mainland. With her friends and family scattered, Effie is surprised to be offered a position working on the Earl’s estate. Sholto is back in her life but their differences now seem insurmountable, even as the simmering tension between them grows. And when a shocking discovery is made back on St Kilda, all her dreams for this bright new life are threatened by the dark secrets Effie and her friends thought they had left behind.

Review
Regular readers of my blog will know that Karen Swan is one of my favourite authors, and I always look forward to her summer and Christmas releases that Pan Macmillan kindly send me to review. The Last Summer is the title of this summers book, and more excitingly it is the first in a series from Karen Swan (Yeah!). Set in 1930 this book starts on the beautiful and wild Island of St Kilda in the Outer Hebrides, where Effie Gilles lives with her father, and the other thirty four residents. Effie is headstrong and strong willed, taking on her brother’s work after his death to support her and her father, but love is something she knows nothing about until the the Earl of Dumfries and his son Sholto visit. After the Islanders vote to leave St Kilda, Effie finds herself at Dumfries House working for the Earl, and back into the life of Sholto. But life on the mainland is very different to the simple life on St Kilda and Effie finds many obsticals to overcome, the largest seeing Sholto in his role as son of an Earl and his place in society.

I think Karen Swan has surpassed herself with this book, it has romance, adventure, thrills and a mystery that make it such a brilliant read. Karen Swan always writes characters that are multi faceted, that develop in ways you don’t always expect and become people you care about. Effie is a dynamic heroin, very much the tomboy on St Kilda, wearing her brothers clothes, taking on his responsibilities, and matching any man in mountain climbing. She is headstrong, wanting to be seen as an equal by the men as she takes on the same work to feed and look after her father. Living on St Kilda is a simple but hard life, cut off from the mainland for most of the year, life dependent on the seasons and having to kill your food to eat it. Effie however loves this life and is one of the few isanders who doesn’t want to evacuate the island for the main land. Watching her navigate her new life was like watching Alice in Wonderland as she saw her refection for the first time, using stairs, indoor plumbing and the fact that people wear shoes. Like Alice, she is caught between two worlds, the one she is use to, looking after her father, living a simple life, against Sholto’s life in a huge house, the parties and the company he keeps, that she feels awkward in; there were several points I felt sorry for her being put in situations she can’t handle. Like on the Island where her life blurred the lines it was the same at Dumfies House where she wasn’t a servant or a friend of the family.

Whilst Effie is kind and caring there is of course someone who is her antithesis, in this case Lady Sibyl Wainright, part of the Bright Young People who partied hard and caused scandal. I would describe her as a spider who weaves a web slowly around Effie to draw her in to ultimatley humiliate her in a cruel and shocking manner. There are a brilliant cast of characters in this book, too many to describe, but all have different stories to share that add to the charm of the book.

St Kilda is not a place I know well, but during my reading of The Last Summer I found myself looking it up on the internet. Karen Swan is known for her descriptive prose bringing to the life the many locations her books are set in, and the setting of St Kilda is no exception. Her prose paints a picture with all the detail of an artist, as she captures the contrasting wildness and beauty of the Island. The research into the Island and it’s history I found fascinating, how rent was paid in feathers and sheep wool, the danger posed by the weather, and that there had been a community there for over two thousand years. There are many layers to this book, the history of St Kilda, the camararderie of it’s community, their evacuation of the Island and the new challenges faced on the mainland, the forbidden love affair and a mystery linked to the island.. There is an undercurrent of suspense over the missing person, with deatils drip fed through the book and lead to a cliffhanger of an ending.

It is no surprise that I adored The Last Summer and I think cements Karen Swan’s place as one of the countries best selling authors. Effie makes for a fabuous heroine, and one I found I became invested in the more I learnt about, and I can’t wait to find out where her story takes her. With it’s mix of forbidden love, adventure, suspense, thrills and a stunning setting this is the perfect summer read and one I highy recommend; another masterpiece from Karen Swan, I can’t wait for the next book.

I would like to thank Pan Macmillan of my copy of this book in return for my honest review.