Islands of Abandonment

Life in the Post-Human Landscape

By: Cal Flyn

Narrated by: Cal Flyn

Length: 9 hrs and 6 mins

Publisher's summary

The Sunday Times' Science and Environment Book of the Year 2021

Winner of the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award

Shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize 2021

Shortlisted for the Wainwright Conservation Award 2021

Shortlisted for the British Academy Book Prize 2021

Shortlisted for the Highland Book Prize 2021

This is a book about abandoned places: ghost towns and exclusion zones, no man’s lands and fortress islands—and what happens when nature is allowed to reclaim its place.

In Chernobyl, following the nuclear disaster, only a handful of people returned to their dangerously irradiated homes. On an uninhabited Scottish island, feral cattle live entirely wild. In Detroit, once America’s fourth-largest city, entire streets of houses are falling in on themselves, looters slipping through otherwise silent neighbourhoods.

This book explores the extraordinary places where humans no longer live—or survive in tiny, precarious numbers—to give us a possible glimpse of what happens when mankind’s impact on nature is forced to stop. From Tanzanian mountains to the volcanic Caribbean, the forbidden areas of France to the mining regions of Scotland, Flyn brings together some of the most desolate, eerie, ravaged and polluted areas in the world—and shows how, against all odds, they offer our best opportunities for environmental recovery.

By turns haunted and hopeful, this luminously written world study is pinned together with profound insight and new ecological discoveries that together map an answer to the big questions: what happens after we’re gone, and how far can our damage to nature be undone?

©2021 Cal Flyn (P)2021 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic reviews

"The most precious hymn to resilience...written with a beautiful attention to detail.... Wonderful." (Adam Nicolson, winner of the 2018 Wainwright Prize)

"A redemptive, celebratory pageant of a book, rich in reflection and revelation...beautifully written.... I've no doubt torrents of accolades await." (Gavin Francis, author of Island Dreams)

"Meticulous research, lyrical writing.... Ultimately it shows how nature can heal a landscape broken by human.... At a time when writing about nature can be depressing, a book that goes to the most depressing places on Earth and finds hope is a revelation." (Louise Gray, author of The Ethical Carnivore)

Thoughtful and beautifully written and read.

Cal is really great at setting the scene, and I love where it goes. As a Scot I also really appreciated hearing about Scottish abandoned places, and hearing it read by a fellow Scot (the author, of course). Recommended.

Stunning book

This is a travelogue in which the author takes us to abandoned places and with meticulous research gives insights into recent history. Fascinating and enjoyable and beautifully written.