Paula Xiberras
An archipelago is the collective name for a group of islands and fittingly finds its word origin from the Greek for ‘sea.’
Gregory Day’s novel ‘Archipelago of Souls’ is about two islands, wartime Crete and peacetime King Island and the sea between. It’s also a novel about souls that reside in both of these islands and in the case of Wesley’s brother, a soul lost to the sea.
The sea separates siblings in the form of Wesley Cross and his brother during their time in Crete. Wesley has every right, as his name suggests to be cross as he was his brother’s keeper. The islands then are both literal and metaphorical, representative latterly of characters isolated for whatever reason.
The character of the postman provides the connection between the island and the mainland which could otherwise only be bridged, pardon the pun, by a boat. The postman is the intermediary who also bridges the islands the novel’s characters represent.
The author of this lyrical novel is Gregory Day who tells me when we chat that he wanted to be a writer from his teenage years. Gregory has a fascination for islands, most notably, King Island. He loves them because you can ‘find the edges’.
As the story moves between the islands of Crete and King Island we are introduced to a real historical character in the form of archaeologist and wartime British intelligence officer John Pendlebury who, in the novel discovers ‘a shard’ depicting the image of a dolphin ridden by a man with a child on his shoulders. The motif, says Gregory, represents freedom, perhaps something desired in those wartime years and achieved in the present day King Island.
Gregory comments on writing the quote that ‘a work of art is never finished; only abandoned.’ His idea about writing is ‘not to give too much away’ but let the reader be the archaeologist and make discoveries themselves.
As to the possibilities of making the book into a film Greg believes in author Morris Gleitzman’s idea of ‘the magic spaces’, the connection between reader and author unique to every individual. Gregory believes that film cannot recreate that very personal experience a reader has with a book or indeed the author’s personal vision that informs their writing, for example, the farm scenes Enid Blyton created in her novels were ‘her farm,’ her very own personal vision that her readers recreate from their own experience of reading the book.
The picture painted by the author will be embellished by the reader’s own experiences making everyone’s reading a completely unique experience. Archipelago of Souls is such an experience.
‘Archipelago of Souls’ is out now published by Macmillan.
