Having lived and worked in the Solomon Islands' capital Honiara in the 70s - see here - I was keen to read this book by Will Randall who, once a happy schoolteacher, found himself dispatched to a small village on Rendova Island, a not very large island in the Solomons. His mission: to fulfil the dying wishes of an old man and help the local people set up a money-making community project.
The Solomon Islands, islands lost in time - Solomon Time; these little gems of land scattered across the ocean, must be the last sanctuary on our shrivelled planet not yet overshadowed by the Golden Arches or encapsulated in a Coca-Cola bubble. Everyone has dreamed at some time of living on a desert island. Here is the unvarnished truth. Sharks, turtles, a band of unruly chickens, a cast of extraordinary characters, and a bird called the Spangled Drongo, accompany Will Randall through some of the most fascinating and certainly funniest scenes to be found in travel writing since Gerald Durrell.
It closes with a quote from Arthur Grimble's charming book "A Pattern of Islands": 'the islands are like a drug; they entice you and they lull you. They will lure. You will be hooked. You will always want to go back.'
A fantastic read!
