The Barra Boy

I love Barra and the descriptive passages in this book took me right back there. It's a well written book with brilliant characterisation, all wrapped up with a good storyline. I felt as if I was on the journey with Ewan, the main character, as we read about adolescence and life on a Scottish island. It's a lovely cosy tale to curl up with as Ewan revisits the island he spent a summer in and tries to unravel an old mystery. I would recommend the read and thanks to Net Galley for my ARC.

A wonderful coming of age book set on the Isle of Barra(Scotland). The main character, Ian Fraser, returns to Barra to face his memories of what happened there when he was a 13 year old. A wonderful book to read and enjoy, the descriptions of the island make me want to get on a plane tomorrow . I will recommend to my friends who love Scotland as much as I do.

Beautifully written and descriptive, I felt like I was there in Barra. Wonderful, engaging characters and a great storyline. Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy.

This is a good summer read. Ewan Fraser, a successful lawyer in London, sees the face of a teenage boy from the subway one day and is immediately transported back to a childhood summer spent on Barra Island: A summer full of grief and friendship, a teenage crush, and a dark mysterious secret kept among the residents of the small island. The journey back there as an adult serves to bring about some closure and clarity for Ewan. I thoroughly enjoyed this book! Iain Kelly captures the depth of Ewan's teenage feelings about grief, infatuation, friendship, and family while slowly unfurling a tightly guarded town secret. This book is a good mixture of a mystery (not a thriller) and a coming-of-age story. And now I have yet another destination added to my ever-growing list of places to visit someday: Scotland and Barra Island. Happy reading! (less)

I enjoyed this book thoroughly, it is engaging and I loved how it described everything to make it feel like you were there, very well written and fantastic characters. #netgalley #thebarraboy

Ewan Fraser cannot get his summer in Barra as a young teenager out of his mind. 40 years later he still sees faces he fleetingly recognises and so he takes the decision to go back and put the ghosts of his past to rest.

In 1982 he was sent away from Glasgow to stay with relatives in Barra while his mother is ill in hospital. A place of new friendship and secrets just below the surface. Issues that adults try to keep to themselves and that have the power to hurt.

I found the book had a bit of a slow start and the writing seemed a little clunky but once it got into its stride I-was completely taken in by the story. A lovely evocative book.

The Barra Boy by Iain Kelly

Ewan Fraser is an ageing lawyer in a London office. He grew up in Glasgow but that was a long time ago. He’s on ‘close friends’ basis with a woman who works in the next building and they meet daily for morning coffee. Ewan Fraser's life is predictable and safe until one morning, from the train, he sees a face from the past. Billy Matheson. Ewan is reminded of a summer on Barra and the unanswered questions he left behind when he departed suddenly to attend his mother's funeral. Seeing Billy Matheson's face, it wasn't him of course, it was so many years ago, Ewan is sufficiently troubled as to immediately take leave and fly to Glasgow and then to Barra.

It is 1982 and 13-year-old Ewan has been dispatched from his home in Glasgow to Barra to live with his aunt and uncle, leaving his father to attend to his dying mother.

Ewan is downbeat; instead of helping his sick mother he’s facing a tedious summer on remote and sparsely-populated Barra. His aunt is well-meaning and his uncle, Ewan’s father’s brother, is rather grim. To add to Ewan’s first and less-than-positive impressions of the island’s inhabitants, he sees a younger boy hiding in a cave at a beach. The boy runs off without speaking. Ewan’s aunt and uncle make it very clear that Ewan must have nothing to do with Billy, but refuse to say why. ‘You’re too young to understand.’ The boy, Billy Matheson, appears again on another day making Ewan feel he is being followed.

Ewan makes friends with a local girl, Laura, and together they explore the island by bicycle. One day they’re joined at a beach by Billy and his mother Mhairi. Mhairi and her son are shunned by the other islanders and Ewan wants to know why. He and Laura overhear a snippet of a heated conversation between the Catholic priest and Mhairi and that leads Ewan to the church where he eavesdrops on a conversation between the priest and Laura’s mother which leads him, eventually, to the truth about Mhairi and Billy.

Ewan’s father calls; his mother has died and he leaves without time to say goodbye to Laura which is why Ewan Fraser, the ageing London lawyer finds himself back on Barra, knocking on the door of Laura Roberston’s house.

Haven’t we all got memories from childhood that don’t make sense? Wouldn’t we all like to travel back in time or place to get the answers to questions that have ached inside us for years?

I loved this book. The characters are carefully crafted, the plot skips along at a very readable pace, indeed the characters are the plot. As we would expect a small community like that on Barra would be complicated and tense and this is communicated to the reader in vivid clarity. The language supports the locations and the destination is well worth the journey. The closing chapters were the perfect ending to the book's well-constructed literary question.

This book reads like almost a biography, but it's really fiction. But it gives you an amazing feel for the Scottish Isle of Barra (our ancestor's home!). Like others, an unresolved mystery and a decision unmade haunt Ewan as he is making changes in his personal life, so he decided to go to Barra to right what he should have done when he was there at the age of 13, By going back and forth in time, the author allows us to get into Ewan's thoughts and memories, and understand why he is there. It's a stunning book in it's simplicity and t's one to relish as Summer ends.

This book is not only dramatic and engrossing, it is also insightful and wise. Read it! Read it! You will never forget it! The descriptions of Barra are amazing, I could feel the breeze on my face.

Memories of a childhood summer on a Scottish island, and the secrets it held. Lovely descriptions of a beautiful landscape, which evoke childhood holidays which so often are better in hindsight.

With thanks to NetGalley and The Book Guild for an ARC.

This is definitely one of my favourite reads so far this year. I love the Scottishness (is that a word?) of it all. I love the evocative descriptions of Barra and Vatersay and the combination of the bleak loneliness of the islands perched on the edge of the vast Atlantic with the intense claustrophobia of a small community where the gossips know all one's secrets.
The characterization is absolutely superb. I had so much empathy for Billy and his mother I had to stop reading at times and catch my breath. There is layer upon layer of emotional depth in the unraveling of the secrets of the past. This writer has a great future.

Very enjoyable read. Lovely description of isle life and living on Barra.
Very much a coming of age story with a mystery and such heartbreaking moments!

Definitely took me back to my visits to Barra in my childhood!

Thank you to Netgalley for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
What a beautiful book, the descriptions of Barra are outstanding. I loved everything about this book. I didn't want it to end. A recommended read.

First of all, I have to say that this novel speaks eloquently to the author’s love of the Isle of Barra. Only eleven miles long and six miles wide, I feel almost as if I’ve visited there for a short while. I’ve always wanted to live on an island, so island settings of all sorts are a huge draw for me.

I very much enjoyed the parts of the book which flashed back to the summer of 1982. Despite Ewan’s worry about his mother and father back home, with the help of his newfound friend Laura, he experienced some respite and childish joy in his freedom to roam the island and its beautiful beaches. The tentative friendship of Ewan and Laura with the outcast boy Billy Matheson was one that would probably only happen in such an isolated setting.

“On the surface everything seemed friendly and quaint on this island. Everyone knew each other and got along and was part of the community and looked out for each other. Except for those that were cast out for some reason.”

Billy Matheson and his young mother, Mhairi, were shunned from the social gatherings on the island. The book delves into how an insular community reacts to scandal. Also, it explores how adult ‘secrets’ can impact the young and how childhood memories can have a rosy tint.

With a pace as slow as a child’s summer’s day, “The Barra Boy” was a thoughtful combination of literary fiction and coming-of-age novel, and will undoubtedly remain in my memory for a long while.

Ewan Fraser is travelling on the underground on his way home from work when he sees the face of a young boy & is instantly reminded of Billy, a boy he knew as a youth. One Summer holiday whilst his mother was in hospital terminally ill, his father sent him from Glasgow to Barra in the Outer Hebrides to stay with relatives. It was a Summer he would never forget. He remembered exploring the island with Laura- the girl he never quite forget. Billy & his mother were shunned by most of the community but he & Laura had spent some good times with him. Having seen the boy who reminded him so much of Billy Ewan decides he must return to Barra. Logic tells him that the boy he saw wasn't Billy, but Ewan wants to find out why he & his mother were such outcasts. His return stirs up a lot of old secrets.

I loved this book. The author captures the magic of the Outer Hebrides & also described the summer Ewan could never forget. Thanks to Netgalley & the publisher for letting me read & review this book.

First of all , I love any book that flashes back to the 80's . I felt like I was actually in Barra as the writing was so descriptive .