This Door of the Seas

by Val McDermid, by Jo Sharp

The Darien Venture was the singular event at the end of the seventeenth century that fundamentally altered Scotland’s future.

It took place on the other side of the world, amid the jungle-coastline at the junction between the continents of North and South America. And most of us know next to nothing about it.

Now it’s time to remedy that. Award-winning novelist Val McDermid and Geographer Royal for Scotland Jo Sharp unite in this revelatory novella to trace the story of Scotland’s only trading colony, which turned from a dream of prosperity to a nightmare that bankrupted an already impoverished nation and propelled it towards political union with England.

Written as a series of letters home from expedition scientist Dr James Wallace to his wife Eliza and Sir Robert Sibbald, the first Geographer Royal, this epistolary tale offers a devastating account of the forces that doomed the endeavour and completely changed the history of the British Isles in the process.

Reviews of This Door of the Seas

'As the story unfolds, you realise the horror of the Darien scheme, hardly mentioned in received history . . . a powerful story of creeping betrayal' – Sara Sheridan

'An immersive tale of betrayal and injustice that reverberates with a howl of anguish three centuries old' – Chris Brookmyre

'A beautifully told, gripping romp through the choppy waters of Scotland’s darkest history' – Doug Johnstone