Time was when the semi-wilderness dweller was happy with his chopping, boating and general coping but now island dwellers like Mr. Conover who first appeared in Once Upon an Island (1968), feel constrained to keep writing about what was once fresh and new. The Conovers operated a resort on an island off British Columbia and this is a series of journal entries -- on-season mischances with their boat, plumbing and electricity and loftier off-season pensees. The latter are much more harried and dutiful notations in which reflection has the air of being trawled through Rod McKuen's neaptide efforts: ""I thirst for light like the fir forest, the days being but ways I climb to seek it.