Malachy Tallack

The sixtieth parallel marks a borderland between the northern and southern worlds. Wrapping itself around the lower reaches of Finland, Sweden, and Norway, it crosses the tip of Greenland and the southern coast of Alaska, and slices the great expanses of Russia and Canada in half. The parallel also passes through Shetland, where Malachy Tallack has spent most of his life.In Sixty Degrees North, Tallack travels westward, exploring the landscapes of the parallel and the ways that people have interacted with those landscapes, highlighting themes of wildness and community, isolation and engagement, exile and memory.An intimate journey of the heart and mind, Sixty Degrees North begins with the author's loss of his father and his own troubled relationship with Shetland, and concludes with an embrace of the place he calls home.

Around the World in Search of Home

Sixty Degrees North

Shetland: a place of sheep and soil, of harsh weather, close ties and an age-old way of life. A place where David has lived all his life, like his father and grandfather before him, but where he abides only in the present moment

The Valley at the Centre of the World

1957. Sonny is working on a whaling ship in the South Atlantic, reckoning with the most vicious storms he has ever seen. It's a brutal way to make a living. When he finally returns to his Shetland home to build a life with his wife and young son, the legacy of his time at sea is felt by all of them.

In present day Shetland, Jack is an old man, living alone in the cottage where he grew up, in the shadow of a hill. And it is here, one evening, that something appears on his doorstep. Something that throws off the rhythm of his solitary existence in the most profound way.

This is a story of unlikely friendship, longing, the power of music and the pull of home. It is about a life revisited - and reimagined.

That Beautiful Atlantic Waltz

'Sixty Degrees North is a story that we tell, both to ourselves and to others. It is a story about where - and perhaps also who - we are.' The sixtieth parallel marks a kind of borderland. It wraps itself around the lower reaches of Finland, Sweden and Norway; it crosses the tip of Greenland and of Southcentral Alaska; it cuts the great spaces of Russia and Canada in half. The parallel also passes through Shetland, at the very top of the British Isles. In Sixty Degrees North, Malachy Tallack explores the places that share this latitude, beginning and ending in Shetland, where he has spent most of his life. The book focuses on the landscapes and natural environments of the parallel, and the way that people have interacted with those landscapes. It explores themes of wildness and community, of isolation and engagement, of exile and memory.

a brave book . . . and a beautiful book' - ROBERT MAC FARLA NE 'Malachy Tallack is the real deal, a writer given over to pure curiosity, honest witness and that most precious of gifts, an unselfconscious sense of wonder . . . not just a vibrant new voice, but a wise, questioning and highly sophisticated talent' - JOHN BURNSIDE 'A beautifully written meld of travel writing, natural history and personal memoir . . . a remarkable odyssey' - THE BOOKSELLER Sixty Degrees North is a deeply personal examination of who we are, of the landscapes that truly shape us and what it means to be at home. The sixtieth parallel marks a borderland between the northern and southern worlds. Wrapping itself around the lower reaches of Finland, Sweden and Norway, it crosses the tip of Greenland and the southern coast of Alaska, and slices the great expanses of Russia and Canada in half. The parallel also passes through Shetland, where Malachy Tallack has spent most of his life. In Sixty Degrees North, Tallack travels westward, exploring the landscapes of the parallel and the ways that people have interacted with those landscapes, highlighting themes of wildness and community, isolation and engagement, exile and memory. Sixty Degrees North is an intimate book, one that begins with the author's loss of his father and his own troubled relationship with Shetland, and concludes with an acceptance of loss and an embrace - ultimately a love - of the place he calls home.

Shetland – Schafe und Natur, unbarmherziges Wetter, enge Bindungen und althergebrachte Lebensweisen. Hier, in dem Tal auf einer kleinen Insel, hat David sein ganzes Leben verbracht, wie vor ihm sein Vater und sein Großvater. Hier will Sandy eine neue Heimat finden, hier hat Alice nach dem Tod ihres Mannes Zuflucht gesucht. Aber die Zeiten ändern sich, Menschen sterben oder ziehen weg, und David fragt sich, wie die Geschichten und Traditionen seines Tals weitergeführt werden sollen, während andere zweifeln, ob sie jemals dazugehören werden. Die Geschichte des kleinen Tals birgt die ganze Welt.

Roman

Das Tal in der Mitte der Welt

La valle al centro del mondo

'It's a joy to island-hop through the book. After wowing the world with Sixty Degrees North, Tallack's second book is shaped by the same, clear, sharp prose and keen curiosity. Packed full of intelligent musings on everything from religion to astronomy, alchemy to the occult' - National Geographic Traveller 'This has been a vintage year for books about cartography: Malachy Tallack gave us The Un-Discovered Islands - a swashbuckling romp through 20 islands of the imagination, some of which featured on sea charts for centuries before being proven not to exist' - Scotland on Sunday 'Malachy Tallack is an engaging and fluent writer of essential kindliness' - John MacLeod, Scottish Review of Books 'Tallack teases all this out with great wit and subtlety' - Scotsman 'This is a splendid and wistful book' - Stuart Kelly, Spectator 'One of the best new travel books' - Guardian 'This is a book to cherish and to dip in and out of when time allows' - Lovereading In this new edition, beautifully illustrated with original full-colour maps, are two dozen islands once believed to be real but no longer found on modern maps. These phantom islands are the product of imagination, deception and human error: an archipelago of ex-isles and forgotten lands. From the well-known story of Atlantis to more obscure tales from around the globe, from ancient history right up to the present day, this is an atlas of legend and wonder.

Malachy Tallack

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