Isla Dewar, Isla Dewar

Isla Dewar

Dunne, Apr 2006, $23.95, 320 pp.

ISBN: 0312349467

The Glasgow police inform social studies teacher Iris Chisholm that her husband Harry died in a car accident on an icy road in a part of town that he should not have been at. She and her two teens, Scot and Sophie mourn their loss. His place of business informs Iris that Harry was redundant over two years ago and received severance pay plus his pension investment. Iris also learns that he was behind on mortgage payments and took out a remortgage and cashed in their life insurance. On top of that he has gambling debts to his turf accountant.

Headmistress at her school, Miss Moffat arranges for Iris to move to a rural school as the "Missie". She and her children relocate to Green Cairns in the Highlands. There she becomes embroiled with her students as the only teacher in town, while ignoring her own and her family troubles. While her son and daughter struggle to adjust, Iris shocks the locals, when as the expected virgin pure "Missie" has two local males desiring her.

DANCING IN A DISTANT PLACE is a fabulous family drama starring a woman who struggles to remake her life, but soon finds new personal crisis to cope with. Iris is the center of this fine drama as she starts over and is there for her students, but is not as available to help her stressed teen children, because their problems remind her of what she ran away from. Fans of contemporary fiction will want to read Isla Dewar's deep tale of an individual throwing her soul into the public good, while ignoring the personal calamity that eats at the soul of her and her children.