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well.

Without giving too much away, the book is the story of his search for a people he calls the Albans, who represent the end of a thread that stretches back to the end of the last Ice Age. These people, he claims, were ravaged by a series of invasions by their neighbours, Celts, Romans and later Norse and finally fled west, firstly to Iceland, Greenland and then to the Canadian shores. A combination of a search for safe land to settle on and Walrus herds that provided their livelihood drove them ever further from their European origins and makes them somewhat akin to the settlers of the Wild West of nineteenth century America. What makes the search for these early Scots so fascinating is the modern day journey taken to find evidence of their passing, a journey that takes us through Asia minor, Britain, Iceland, Greenland, the Canadian Arctic, Labrador and finally Newfoundland. What Mowat does well here is combine the skills of writing descriptive travelogue with probing academic research and the result is an enthralling read from a master storyteller. In typical modest fashion Mowat even declares that his book is not to be regarded as history in the academic sense as there is a large amount of supposition on his part, but here I feel he is doing himself a disservice and is as valuable as any other popular market history book of recent times. After all a footnote in Gibbon's "History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" said pretty much the same thing and that work has become an icon in the history of academic writing.

It's a fascinating and easy flowing book that mixes information, travel, history and story telling and takes use through the wild wind swept shores and hinterlands of northern Europe and America. Hopefully it completes one small page of mans history and as such will hopefully be seen as an import work for that reason. But apart from its value to posterity, Farley Mowat's search of a lost tribe is a wonderful read that will appeal to anyone interested in the cultural movements, lost races and especially anyone who is in love with the wild and wind ravaged seaboards of the north Atlantic.

The Alban Quest is published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson but I managed to purchase my copy through "The Ancient and Medieval History Book Club" for around 12. Amazon and e-buy and similar sites will probably have paperback copies for a few pounds and I have even seen a copy up for grabs on readitswapit.com.

Learn more about this author, Dave Franklin.
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