Bleaker House by Nell Stevens

"Bleaker House", by Nell Stevens

Twenty-seven-year-old Nell Stevens was determined to write a novel, but somehow life kept getting in the way. Then came an irresistible opportunity: she won a fellowship to spend three months, all expenses paid, anywhere in the world to research and write a book. Did she choose a glittering metropolis, a romantic village, an exotic paradise? Um, no. Nell chose Bleaker Island, a snowy, windswept pile of rock off the Falklands. There, in a guesthouse where she would be the only guest, she imagined she could finally rid herself of distractions and write her 2,500 words a day. In three months, surely she'd have a novel, right?

     It's true that there aren't many distractions on Bleaker, other than sheep, penguins, paranoia and the weather. But as Nell gets to work on her novel--a delightful Dickensian fiction she calls Bleaker House--she discovers that an excruciatingly erratic Internet connection and 1100 calories a day (as much food as she could carry in her suitcase, budgeted to the raisin) are far from ideal conditions for literary production. With deft humour, this memoir traces Nell's island days and slowly reveals details of the life and people she has left behind in pursuit of her art. They pop up in her novel, as well, as memoir and novel start to reflect one another. It seems that there is nowhere Nell can run--neither a remote island nor the pages of her notebook--to escape herself.

Have to say it was no surprise as to how this book will end.  However the journey along the way with Nell made it interesting.  I would have liked to have read more about life on the Falkland Islands.  Although I had heard of the Falkland Islands I had never heard of Bleaker Island prior to reading this book.  I had to look it up, and you can read more about it here.

Despite what Nell went through, I am very interested in the Falkland Islands and would love to visit there.  I think everyone should try the whole spending time to find themselves thing.   

Stars out of 5 : 3  Read better books, but didn't mind it.  Learned something new, so that is always a positive.  I will never been a writer, but I am guessing if you want to write a book, this book would benefit you with the thought process.

This is my own review; I borrowed the book from my local library.