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The Island: A Short Story
The Island: A Short Story
The Island: A Short Story
Ebook30 pages14 minutes

The Island: A Short Story

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

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With Star Over Bethlehem, the beloved Queen of Mystery Agatha Christie shines in a totally unexpected way, offering readers a wondrous collection of poems and holiday short stories.

A retelling of the Christmas Story in a way you’ve never heard it before. . . . The fable of a donkey who carries a mother and child safely to Egypt. . . . The tale of a widow who dislikes people until she meets a stranger. . . .

From the most popular writer of all time comes a treasured collection of short stories and poems celebrating the holiday season.

This special edition also contains a wealth of Agatha Christie rarities—not only all the stories, poems, and illustrations from her long out-of-print book Star over Bethlehem (1965) but also a reproduction of all her rare poetry from the two collections The Road of Dreams (1924) and Poems (1973).

LanguageEnglish
PublisherHarperCollins
Release dateDec 10, 2013
ISBN9780062303233
The Island: A Short Story
Author

Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie is known throughout the world as the Queen of Crime. Her books have sold over a billion copies in English with another billion in over 70 foreign languages. She is the most widely published author of all time and in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. She is the author of 80 crime novels and short story collections, 20 plays, and six novels written under the name of Mary Westmacott.

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Reviews for The Island

Rating: 3.7049180327868854 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

61 ratings33 reviews

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I loved it. Never expected Agatha to have written any spiritual/ religious work. This is short and a quick read. Those who have read the bible will be able to connect the dots.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    TestReview
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Very good! It's quite brilliant. We are asking ourselves what, when, who, and then we have a big surprise. Beautiful!
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
     Read this one at work, as lighter relief from Milton at home. It was OK, I suppose. All family trials and tribultions. Has Alexis debating of she wants to spend the rest of her life with Ed, who is superficially perfect, but sounds like an arse to me. However she, frankly, is a bit drippy too. Her mother has never spoken about her family or upbringing, but on a visit to Crete, she visits the village of her mother's birth, and finds out the long story from a friend of her mother's. the modern story bookends the past, but the two barely interact throughout the length of the book, so at no point do we discover how this is impacting on Alexis. All just a bit too neat and compartmentalised. The back story is pretty sensational, murder, adultery, leprosy and isolation on a leper island. The cover blurb described it as a beach book, and that about sums it up, it's mildly diverting, but that's about it.

    1 person found this helpful

  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Really enjoyed this book. I couldn't put it down. Different topic and very interesting. Amazing to read about the leper colony on the island and how they formed a strong community.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is a book filled with much sadness but also with much joy. Through the telling of this story we discover how people react when they are faced with the fragile balance between love and hate, forgiveness and the burden of regret.On the Cretan island of Plaka, many families have been touched by the spectre of leprosy. It hovers over the island, filling the inhabitants with dread, bringing out caring and love in many, fear and loathing in others. Lepers beset by the disease on Plaka or or other nearby islands, are sent to the island of Spinalonga, always within sight of Plaka, but a world unto itself. There always seems to be two stories going on, but connected in some way to the other. The story begins when Alexis goes to Plaka to uncover her mother's past. What she discovers both shocks her and determines her future.What I enjoyed most about "The Island" was the very unique writing style of the author. One of the few drawbacks to reading constantly is finding that so many authors write in styles similar to another author. It is always a joy to discover an author whose style "stands out". Hislop's empathetic prose does not interfere with the telling of the story, but rather adds to the sense of realism. The reader feels as though they are experiencing the heartbreak of the patient suffering from leprosy or a family member losing their loved one as the "patient" goes to live on the lepers island. They are so close and yet so far away on Spinalonga. The inhabitants of the lepers island set up their own government and public works, have their own elections and try with what little they have to make the island their "home".In another example of the choices that life constantly offers us, a relationship develops between one of the doctors and a patient. This development is unusual because there is rarely any kind of commitment between lepers and those free of the disease because of the impossibility of a future together. But "The Island " is one of those rare books that reminds us of the balance between hope and despair and revealed through dire circumstances, that life offers us if we dare to embrace the opportunity.I recommend this as a quick read-473 pages-of great depth and good writing.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    wow :)
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Alexis is about to go on holiday with her boyfriend, to the country of her mother's birth Greece. She knows nothing about her heritage and suggests that she might visit the village her mother was born in. Armed with a letter to one of her mother's friends Alexis embarks on a journey that she will never forget.Having reached Crete she leaves her boyfriend heads to the village. She embarks on a trip to the nearby deserted island of Spinalonga, which she establishes is a former leper colony. She spends a few hours there and heads back to the village to seek out her mother's friend. She meets up with Fortini who then shares with her the loves and lives of her mother and the generations that went before her and the connection the family has to Spinalonga.This was a fabulous read. Read over the course of 24 hours. I could barely put down and did so reluctantly.A wonderfully written book and is recommended.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The Island is beautifully written. I enjoyed the history which unfolds for the main character. I was unaware of a Leper colony off the coast of Crete but was fascinated by a group of people sent away for life. The only thing which kept me from giving this 5 stars was the ending seemed very rushed. The book was moving along smoothly then boom....lots of events happen in the last few chapters. It didn't flow as well as it should have. All in all, a fantastic read.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    An interesting book set on and around a leper colony just off the coast of Crete. I didn't find the story itself that interesting the main characters a rather plain and one dimensional. There is nothing in the plot to excite or surprise the reader. However that said the setting is very interesting and the book gives brilliant insight into the everyday lives of people living on the island of Spinalonga. The book is well worth reading for this alone.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A fairly easy read, a bit too predicable for my liking though. It was billed as a holiday read, so probably not the best book to read in a cold and snowy December! The story is mainly set in Crete, and I did like the descriptions of life on a the Greek island. I can imagine life was pretty much as set out in the book. It's about a family who are affected by leprosy - both the sufferers and the people who are affected by their loved ones with the illness, and about finding love in the most difficult of circumstances. It was a little bit overdone at times, and, as mentioned above, I found it to be a little too predictable.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Excellent...a great plot and the sort of book that you can picture it as if you are familiar with the setting would highly recommend.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Small Island - BIG storyThis was an interesting read. Learning more about Crete and the Leper Colony that existed on the Island of Spinalonga Island, just of the coast from Plaka. The author is a travel writer, I believe, and that certainly came through in this , her first novel. I was almost more interested in Crete culture, Greek history, and the everyday life in the Leper Colony than I was in the story of the three generations of women who were connected to Plaka/Spinalonga. I especially liked reading about the era during WWII and the German occupation of Greece. It is an era that I have not read about before. The characters are fine, but, the story is fairly predictable. The friendship between two of the main young women is pleasant and an important part of the story. Worthwhile and entertaining, but not a book that I would likely re-read. Three Stars out of a possible Five Stars. ***
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    There is an absolutely heartrending section close to the beginning of this book; rarely have I been kept awake so late into the night reading and blubbing alternately.Unfortunately, I found the remainder of the book rather ordinary in comparison - nothing that really reached the emotional heights of those earlier events. There is a point late on where a character is rushed onto a plane in order to tell her story in person, and I was practically shouting 'Save the cost of a plane ticket - I guessed the ending fifty pages ago'
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I don't normally choose 'family saga' novels, but there was something very appealing about the premise of this one. Set on Crete, specifically around the little fishing village of Plaka, it tells the story of several generations of Petrakis women, and their ties to the leper colony on Spinalonga, the little island just off the coast. Alexis, British-born and half-Greek, is determined to find out about her mother's family history, despite her unfathomable secrecy. Finally relenting, Sofia sends her daughter to an old friend in Plaka, who finally tells her the story of her family, beginning with her great-grandmother Eleni and her great-grandfather Georgiou and continuing through the years to her mother's lifetime.I found this to be a very evocative book, filled with the sights, sounds and scents of life in rural Greece. It was also quite educational, giving as it does a comprehensive, if fictionalised, account of life in the leper colony on Spinalonga. It taught me a lot about leprosy, in terms of the disease itself and of the way it was viewed by society at that time. Aspects of the stigma of having a disease and the embarrassment of its physical manifestation continue to ring true for other illnesses and disabilities today, providing an interesting comparison and a pause for reflection. The descriptions of the community on the island were alive with colour and feeling, and I felt myself sinking into the unfamiliar setting and becoming deeply absorbed in the narrative as the family's story unfolded.I can't believe it's taken me so many years to finally get to this book, but I'm glad I finally plucked it down from the shelf and gave it the attention it deserves. I can see why this book became a bestseller, and I'll be recommending it heartily to anyone looking for a summer read with an wide sweep, a Mediterranean flavour, a thoughtful theme and a whole lot of heart.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Despite its promise, I found this international bestseller deeply disappointing. The setting is fascinating – the island of Spinalonga in Crete, which was a leper colony from 1903 to 1957. Hislop does give the reader some idea of village life in Crete in the 1940’s and 1950’s, but this book could have been so much better. The style is prosaic; every punch is telegraphed and every description is three sentences too long. There is little subtlety in the characterisation and Hislop seems to feel it necessary to explain their every move, leaving nothing to the reader’s imagination. The players are generally cardboard caricatures and it is difficult to find much empathy with them. I persevered to the end, to find out what happened to the settlement on Spinalonga, but found it all very contrived.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Very few books have touched my heart as much as this one did. I just loved reading this book. To start with, I found this book out of the blue. When I picked this book up, I had no clue who the author was (Now I know a lot, did a bit of Bing!) and what the premise of the novel was. Now, I am ever so glad that I picked it up. The book is so touching, filled with laughter, pain, love and life! I was so into the book that I couldnt keep wondering what would happen next. I really wished this book wouldn't end.Its a story of a girl called Alexis who sets out to learn more about her family history. She ends up learning the close relationship her family has had with leprosy and how the disease wrecked her family apart. All the characters in the book are so well thought out and so well written about. The author does just a fabulous job of helping us construct the character's image in our minds. I really like Maria's character. Now I cannot wait to go to Spinalonga! Wish, I get that opportunity.I loved the book so much that I actually forced my girlfriend to read it too and she was equally pleased with the book.I highly recommend this book.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I couldn't put this down. Very well written with the characters coming alive on every page with the plot moving at a fast pace but not that you lose what's going on.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Interesting story but very simplistic writing. I wanted more from the author.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A good read. It is a compassionate account of a young womens life after she makes the terrible discovery that she has leprosy. Not sentimental.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Quick, easy read when you don't want to "think" too much. Sad but interesting family saga involving leprosy and a leper colony off the island of Crete.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This is not the sort of book I woud pick up and read and I can't say I expected to like it but I really tried to. The conceit of a modern girl trying to understand decades of family-history seemed a little trite but fortunately the history itself was fascinating in its subjects.The author's decriptions at the beginning of the book of some domestic details like cafe tables and the colours of the sea were poetically done but some of that seemed to fade from the end of the novel. I also felt that the description of the physicality of leprosy was somewhat haphazard but I'm not an expert. What struck me as most lacking however was the emotional side. I think the author was trying to convey the stiltedness and formality of the era and culture and even perhaps the difficulty of reading the intentions of others. In part perhaps she suceeded with that but I was left without a real sense of connection to the characters and only real sympathy for one old man.Since I think it would be utterly unfair to judge this book on its historical accuracy or otherwise I think that the author did quite a good job of depicting a certain type of community particularly in the pre-WW2 section. For me it was more evocative of the Cretan life than it was of the leper colony which might have benefited from further descriptions of the emotional tensions.Overall the plot was interesting enough to keep my attention, with more than enough tragedy and some redemption for good measure. It was pretty but a little a superficial.Competent but could do better - as Eleni the teacher might be tempted to say..
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I must admit I read this in a rush, and it was only afterwards that the book that I really thought about the book. I looked on the internet for photographs of the island of Spinalonga and recognised it from the descriptions from the book. I seemed to bring the fiction to life.Definitely a book that grows on you.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    An interesting look at what it might have been like inside the leper colony of Spinalonga of the coast of Crete, but the author does not give us any hint of her research, or how much of the story is based on fact. That, plus some stilted dialogue and narrative, lower this books rating a bit, but it remains an engaging story.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    An excellent novel set in Crete. The historical details of the local island leper colony,Spinalonga, are accurate throughout its fifty year history. We follow a Greek family there through the second world war and beyond for four generations. A truly original story, highly recommended.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    On the whole, I really enjoyed The Island. It's a story of life in a small village of Crete which is a short boat ride away from the island of Spinalonga, a former leper colony. The fable-like storytelling style of writing was a bit irritating at times. It seemed overly simplistic and is fine for a short story but not for a novel. I'll take the book for what it is ... a bit over dramatized, a bit of cheesy romance. All the women are devastatingly beautiful and the men are dark and handsome. While reading, you wonder if you would feel as sorry for these people if they were described as ordinary (horrible, I know)! But I have to admit. I cried. It's definitely chick lit but with a bit more purpose as you get a glimpse of what life was like for people banished to a leper colony. I have no idea if the book was historically accurate or not but I won't find myself quoting it just to be on the safe side. Just a bit of light reading.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book was different to a lot of the ones I've read recently, but I really enjoyed it. Set in Crete, it's about a family devasted by leprosy, and the courageous (and not so courageous)ways in which they dealt with the blows life dealt them.The book covers a few decades, meaning that there is a lot of detail covering a few months, and then it jumps a number of years, which was a bit frustrating sometimes.The author is very descriptive in her writing, but occassionally I felt as though she had written a sentence and then decided to pad it out with descriptive words.None of the above critcisms detracted, however, from this being a very good read.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a beautiful book. It relates the story of a Greek family of which the mother and a daughter are sent to Spinalonga, an island where lepres are banned to. But there is more to this story. Each family member is different: Anna, the eldest, who rebels against everything and who is embarrased by the history of her family. Maria who is almost perfect and has to go to Spinalonga. Giorgo, the father, who never complains. Then there is the next generation: Sofia, Anna's daughter and Alexia, Sofia's daughter. All their stories are intertwined.What is a pity about this story, is that there are only good and less good people. There are no nuances. Anna is 'just' rebellious and Maria, Giorgi en Eleni are 'just' perfect.I liked learning about the history of Spinalonga, there is a lot of information about that in the book, albeit romanticized.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I really did enjoy this book. It's described as 'a beach read with a heart' and this is exactly what it is. It's easy to read, not exactly complex or challenging but its a really enthralling, involving story. I loved the setting of the story - a small village on Crete and even though I'd never been to Greece or any of its islands, it was so vivid in my mind. Surprisingly for a book thats considered to be quite lighthearted, it managed to deal with the serious issue of leprosy/disfiguring diseases sensitively and involving them in the plot without ever seeming contrived or self-righteous. The best thing about this book is that you don't feel that it's trying to be something that it's not. It's unpretentious and simple but never boring or dull. Its also never cliched or cheesy. Its just a genuinely enjoyable read. I would definately recommend it. It may not have the tension, the complex imagery and themes and the shocking twists and turns that other books have but you will definately find yourself, like me, wanting to book a trip to Crete for your next summer holiday in the hope of experiencing parts of the novel for yourself.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Alexis, on holiday in Crete, goes on holiday to Crete and seeks out an old friend of her mother's. Her mother would never talk about her past, growing up on Crete, and Alexis hopes to get some answers. She travels to Plaka, and while there is transfixed by the island of Spinalonga, a former leper colony.This is a really great book. I was interested in the character of Alexis immediately, however the majority of the book was a flashback to more than 50 years ago, telling the story of the history of Alexis's family and their connection with Spinalonga. I similarly empathised with all the major characters, and found I learned a lot about leprosy along the way. The book didn't hook me in the way many books (mostly thrillers) do. It's pace is much slower, but you always want to keep reading, and the reading itself is a joy, as it is beautifully written. It conjures up images of summer holidays in Greece too, which can't be a bad thing!

Book preview

The Island - Agatha Christie

Contents

The Island

About the Author

The Agatha Christie Collection

Copyright

About the Publisher

The Island

There were hardly any trees on the island. It was arid land, an island of rock, and the goats could find little to eat. The shapes of the rocks were beautiful as they swept up from the sea, and their colour changed with the changing of the light, going from rose to apricot, to pale misty grey, deepening to mauve and to stern purple, and in a last fierceness to orange, as the sun sank into that sea so rightly called wine-dark. In the early mornings the sky was a pale proud blue, and seemed so high up and so far away that it filled one with awe to look up at it.

But the women of the island did not look up at it often, unless they were anxiously gazing for signs of a storm. They

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