He put his children into the local school and lived quietly, recording his experiences in this blend of anthropology and art, capturing the tensions which both support and threaten a small community.

    However, a sinister military/industrial project, Operation Black Star, requires the island for unspecified purposes and threatens the islanders' way of life. In this, his first novel (1972), George Mackay Brown recreates a week in the life of the island community as they come to terms with the destructiveness of Operation Black Star. A whole host of characters - The Skarf, failed fishermen and Marxist historian; Ivan Westray, boatman and dallier; pious creeler Samuel Whaness; drunken fishermen Bert Kerston; earth-mother Alice Voar, and meths-drinker Timmy Folster - are vividly brought to life in this sparkling mixture of prose and poetry.

    His books - most famously Treasure Island, and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde - continue to be read throughout the world.

    It reveals the desperation of the people and the savagery of their government.