Now We Shall Be Entirely Free: The Waterstones Scottish Book of the Year 2019

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I enjoyed every line, every word of this novel set in 1809 about a soldier, John Lacroix, who has become a deserter. Sightseers would fly to the islands from London, drop anchor in a spot like this, swarm around with their sketch books, then up a ladder again and off to … Iceland. The sun was rising swiftly and he saw that he was standing at the edge of a meadow, the grasses growing from sand, and in the grass myriad small flowers he had not been aware of when he came the first time, that must have been closed against the weather, the chill of evening. Already ensconced on the island is a small family of idealists, living their utopian dream in much the same way that Coleridge and others planned to do on the banks of the Susquehanna River. The delicacy of Miller’s descriptions—of shimmering Hebridean landscapes, of the complex, elegant emotional universes of his lightly sketched protagonists—are enough to continue to engage us without something so crude as a “he’s coming after yer” plot.

By contrast, as Lacroix travels through Britain he finds himself exposed to muggers, swindlers and thieves. The pacing of his story is excellent; his style is crisp; his apprehension of pain is arresting; and his ability to show people trembling at the edge of unreason is compelling. The narrative is framed by beautiful writing and driven by guilt at what men are driven to in extremis. None of this slows down the action, which is essentially a pursuit that starts as the military retreat to Corunna and ends in a manhunt among the Western Isles of Scotland.Much of the book alternates, in thriller-like fashion, between these hunters and their fugitive, who a couple of times unknowingly come within inches of one another.

When I read the opening chapter of this book, however, I was convinced – not so much by the historical details, which are applied sparingly but to good effect, but by the combination of precise and uncluttered visuals, human sympathy and language that can be delicate or blunt or visceral as required, but always beautifully modulated. The writing was so melodramatic and flashy, completely failing in creating any connection to anything or anyone in the story. On one level it is impressive to have a book which makes no attempt at post-modernism (other than using the names of those in the My Lai massacre for some of the characters), at allegory, or at drawing parallels with modern events (any hint of Brexit in the British retreat from Europe is purely accidental) – however, in my view, this robs historical fiction of much of its interest for me. Miller makes good use of the common trope of a geographical voyage also being a voyage of personal discovery, so that the cat and mouse game over time becomes something at once subtler and more complex.

Why Emily was so forgiving (immediately so), when she heard John Lacroix speak of his appalling lack of leadership and inaction at Los Morales. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Miller also intentionally or unintentionally repurposes the My Lai massacre as part of his historical fantasy, even incorporating the names of three court martialed US Army officers.

With writing that's elegiac and enthralling, this is a chase story with a wry edge and a romantic heart. Recommended to fans of historical fiction and even to sceptics like myself - I think anyone who enjoys a story well-told will find something to love here.

Following Captain John Lacroix, who managed to survive the British army’s horrendous retreat through Spain whilst battling Napoleon, the reader quickly discovers his desire to run from his past. The minor characters are drawn well enough in vignettes, and Emily (the romantic connection) is plausible in that women of that era were severely constrained by propriety and a lack of opportunity. It’s also that when Lacroix does finally confess the full story of what happened in Spain, he reveals a paralysis in himself that we are never entirely convinced has been cured. a novel of delicately shifting moods, a pastoral comedy and passionate romance story alternating with a blackly menacing thriller. And when you think it's all done and dusted - the writing by numbers reaching its natural conclusion - the denouement strangely tips all that aside and leaves the reader asking 'what?