THE CAUSEWAY

by P. M. Hubbard ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 13, 1977

As ever, the stark immediacies of Hubbard's seascapes will mesmerize anyone with a weakness for islands and tides--as narrator Peter Grant, a machinery salesman out for a short run, beaches his ailing sailboat on an uncharted piece of Scotland's west coast and is aided by the taciturn couple who occupy the isolated mainland house across the tidal basin. Retired Commander Barlow is a man with a secret, something to do with that uninhabited island where Peter landed; wife Letty is frightened, and a silent bond (slightly reminiscent of Donat and Ashcroft in Hitchcock's 39 Steps) is instantly formed between her and Peter. While their touch-less, kiss-less passion deepens through erratic brief encounters, burly Barlow's trips across the tide-created causeway grow more compulsive. And an extended siege of culminating violence dispatches both Barlow and the island mystery, providing an unconvincingly happy (but terrifically scenic) ending to another of P. M. Hubbard's literate yet utterly unadorned arrangements of plain people and breathtaking places.

Pub Date: Jan. 13, 1977

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1977

Categories: FICTION