A Future in the Glens
Book 1 in the Cannich Series of Novels - Stories of the Highlands in the Days of the Hydro
1947, and it is to Cannich, a backwater in the Highlands of Scotland, that Donald Fraser returns. War weary, conflicted and confused after seven years of soldiering, he expects to find the one-horse town he left; a town that offers him no future. But Cannich is booming! The Hydro has arrived, and with it comes wealth and opportunity. High in the glens engineers are building roads and dams, tunnels and power stations. In these new Highlands the drivers and riggers, the tunnellers and joiners, are earning vast amounts of money and spending it like there's no tomorrow. Young men are leaving the land and the old ways eager to share in this post war bonanza. Hydro-electric power is the future, he is told. A future that will reverse the decline of years gone by and revitalise the Highlands. But is there, for Donald Fraser, a future in the glens?
Autorentext
Author David Charles was born in Glasgow, Scotland but brought up on the Yorkshire coast - 'An idyllic childhood' he recalls - returning to Glasgow, with his family, in his early teens. After leaving school with little idea of what he really wanted to do, and having qualified as a chartered company secretary, he returned to full time study in his mid twenties and graduated LL.B in 1981. Thereafter, thirty years as a criminal defence lawyer saw him forge a successful career in courts throughout Scotland where his travels fomented an enduring love of the Highlands, its glens and mountains. Leisure time spent walking those mountains provided him with , ' . . . the best research I could have asked for . . . ' when it came to setting his novels in Scotland's Hydro country.