Spanning time and space

This is a tale, told in letters, which spans the two world wars and two continents.

It starts in 1912 when Elspeth Dunn receives a letter from a college student in America. Elspeth, a published poet and married woman, lives on the island of Skye in Scotland and has never set foot off the island. She receives her first fan letter from David Graham and they strike up a correspondence.

They become friends as, through their letters, they share their favourite books, their adventures, secrets and yearnings.

In 1940, Elspeth’s daughter Margaret is in love with her best friend, a pilot in the Royal Air Force, and cannot understand why her mother is warning her against love in wartime. When, after a bomb hits too close to home and the letters Elspeth had hidden in the wall come raining down, she disappears with the letters.

With one of the letters to guide her, Margaret sets out to find her mother, but also the truth about her father and what happened to her mother’s family so long ago.

This was a enchanting book and I could not put it down. Because you are reading these characters’ letters, instead of normal prose, you get drawn into their story and you cannot help but fall in love with them.

I was so captivated by Letters from Skye that I couldn’t put it down, even while cooking, as I could not wait to get to the next letter, and the next.

To me it was like coming across old love letters between your great-grandparents, and, although you know you shouldn’t read someone else’s letters, it is just too tempting to resist.

If you are in the mood for some light reading that will touch your heart, then this is the book for you.