Charlie's Reviews > An Island to Oneself

The story I think is well known. I really enjoyed it.

As I read it though, something didn't quite add up. An afternoon in Suwarrow narrated in dozens of pages, 6 years in Racatonga go by in two minutes. It is then discovered at the end of the book thanks to an epilogue written by his daughter(!!) (who is still alive and has a family), Tom Neale had married and still left his wife and two children to go to the island the second time. How this doesn't appear in Tom's book leaves me dumbfounded and cast a dark shadow over the entire tale.

It no longer seemed to me a gesture of freedom and a living in contact with nature but rather an extremely selfish escape from reality.

As others have said, he lives in a heavenly place but spends all his time talking about his chicken coop and his primitive oven. I think Tom has really been too self-focused without looking for a gesture of rebirth.

I think he is also a product of another time, today impossible to think of going to a desert island and start killing everything that moves on there with impunity. Still feel sad for that turtle!