The Island Escape

Travel Guide

You can imagine the scenario – the drudgery of daily life and marriage and days spent wondering what could have been. Best friends Octavia and Roberta are both in unhappy marriages and so when Roberta’s marriage ends, Octavia starts to get ever restless.

The opening sentence draws you right in to the life and plight of these women –

“I was wearing the wrong bra for sitting in a police cell.”

From then on this is a journey that takes you through the myriad of serious problems that any 30 odd year old woman could be going through – marriage struggles, break ups, career issues, children and inner torment of what might have been.

The island part of the story doesn’t come into play in to much later in  the novel that you might expect. Rather this is a tale of two female friends journeying the rocky road of unhappiness together. No sad tale this one though as its full of laughter, humour and wry smiles. As Octavia prepares to seek out the man she was once in love with –

Age was my disguise. I put on my sun hat anyway . Less Room with a View and more Carry on Corsica

Once the island comes into play however the affect is summery and mysterious in equal measure –

I almost didn’t want to look across the waves. A little ferry boat made white tracks across the sea, Corsica bound…

But the shadowy clouds of doubt and regret are always on the horizon and Octavia and Roberta have taken very different paths in life, Octavia now searching for her past in the sandy beaches of Corsica. There are many surprises buried there and the digging is a whole lot of fun..