The Colony
AUDREY MAGEE
(FABER &?faber, 384 PP, £14.99)
Tablet bookshop price £13.49 • tel 020 7799 4064

“The boatman shrugged … Lloyd shrugged … James shrugged … he shrugged … she shrugged.” The island’s few inhabitants have not much to say, but plenty to do. Fishing, hunting, knitting. It’s enough to get food on the table. We are on a small island off the coast of Ireland, grey, rocky, windswept, where Irish is still spoken and life remains unchanged.

But change is coming. The Colony, Audrey Magee’s second novel, covers one summer in 1979 as two outsiders – one Englishman, one Frenchman – travel to the island and upset the natural order. The Englishman, Mr Lloyd, is a painter come to produce his masterpiece; the Frenchman, Masson, is a linguist studying the unspoilt language. Caught between is 15-year-old James, desperate to see the world. In the background is constant news of the Troubles.