FIRE ON THE WATER

Of smug, pious Braw Glen, a wee Scotch fishing village adjoining Ayr, whose church sitting community is treated to a rare show as the MacReas, father, mother and son, make the two-faced lot turn about. For Rab and Sa'ty Meg mourn herring-fishing John in separate ways -- Sa'ty Meg making a feud with John's old friend, Tam Gibson and Rab turning on Bible pounder, Reverend Rafferty, over the treatment of half-daft, illegitimate, Sandy. Rab's actions and his devotion to the poverty stricken during the herring slack turn righteous, passion-needing Jeanie against him and toward suspiciously born Mungo: Meg's hatred of the Gibsons turns Rab from Sheila Gibson's intelligent understanding; and until the little town is fed and paid, and Jeanie's ugly stories against Sandy are proved false by Sa'ty Meg and Mungo himself, Rab is tagged an uncontrollable rebel. Freed of Jeanie, Sa'ty Meg's death further frees him for Sheila. A pungent story of basketing herring, of the seriousness of sickly superstition, of empty bellies and pockets, this has the feel and touch of Clydeside people and their life.