Book Review - The Rocks Remain by Gavin Maxwell

 The Rocks Remain by Gavin Maxwell

London: Longmans, 1963

Many many years ago (in a different century, before mobile phones and the internet) I read Gavin Maxwell's Ring of Bright Water. It was not a book I would have chosen to read, but I am very glad that my school put it on the curriculum, as Maxwell's tale of adopting and looking after otters in the wilds of Western Scotland is a wonderful book, which has sold in the millions since its publication in 1960.

The Rocks Remain, a sequel to Ring of Bright Water, does not quite live up to the charm of the first book, partly because it is not a connected narrative (chapters move from Morocco to Majorca, London to Camusfearna), and because the book is clouded over with disasters both major and minor. The book starts with Maxwell's description of the Agadir earthquake, of which he witnessed the aftermath at first-hand.

The parts of the book that deal with Scotland introduce us to three new otters - Teko, Mossy and Monday, and the descriptions of their introduction to Camusfearna, and all the trouble and joy they gave Maxwell, his wife and his helpers Jimmy and Terry, are enjoyable to read. We are re-introduced to Edal, and the terrible injuries she inflicted on Terry, which meant that she was no longer handled by humans as much. The otter star of this book is Monday, an incredibly intelligent animal who continually out-witted Maxwell's attempts to keep her in an enclosure.

Other stories centre around the Polar Star, a motor launch that caused Maxwell many problems and was nearly sunk during a dark and windy night. There is a chapter describing a fire at Camusfearna that could have been catastrophic if it wasn't for Maxwell's quick reaction. There are several chapters that revolve around Maxwell's trips to Morocco, and an incident in Majorca when someone stole his Mercedes 300SL and destroyed it in an accident.

One gets the impression that Maxwell was not perhaps the nicest of people - as this book was written after Ring of Bright Water was released, Camusfearna becomes a bit of a tourist attraction, which Maxwell loathes, and his descriptions of his interactions with curious trekkers are a bit of a low point of the book.

And maybe that's why The Rocks Remain is not as satisfying as that first book. Maxwell writes as one who is a little jaded, as one who has more responsibilities and as such cannot spend as much time at Camusfearna with the otters, and who in some ways as one who has lost his way a little. During the book he gets married, and it is sad to know that his marriage only lasted a year, and that he was dead (of lung cancer) before the end of the decade.

If you loved Ring of Bright Water, and you track this book down, it's worth reading. If you have not read the first book, I strongly suggest reading that first, before reading The Rocks Remain.

Cheers for now, from

A View Over the Bell