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This Door of the Seas: Darkland Tales by Jo Sharp

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This Door of the Seas: Darkland Tales

Author
Jo Sharp
Publisher
W. F. Howes Ltd
Publish Date
6 August 2026
Run Time
4 hours 2 minutes
Format
Audiobook

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What to expect

Award-winning novelist Val McDermid and Geographer Royal Professor Jo Sharp bring Scotland’s greatest historical catastrophe vividly to life.
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.

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Details

Author
Jo Sharp
Narrator
Andrew Rothney, Jo Sharp, Val McDermid
Duration
4 hours 2 minutes
Release Date
6 August 2026
ISBN
9781004262632
Format
Audiobook
Publisher
W. F. Howes Ltd

Synopsis

Award-winning novelist Val McDermid and Geographer Royal Professor Jo Sharp bring Scotland’s greatest historical catastrophe vividly to life.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.

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