The Island at the End of Everything
Page 17
The two women looked at each other, the clock ticking into the stilled moment. Then, Mistress gently passed the baby to Mr Rey, who took her, cooing softly. Finally, Ami slid the mistress’ glove off her hand, and Sol saw that it was small and nubbed.
‘Hello, Mari,’ said the butterfly zookeeper.
Sol saw what would follow, with the shining clearness of a sky after rain: the life Mari had talked about one night on Culion Island, all those years ago. Somewhere with trees, and flowers, and fruit and a river. A house with Ami, in the heart of a forest, its walls alive and blazing with butterflies.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Fiction is sometimes at its best when there is fact at its heart. Culion Island is a real place in the Philippines, and it really did become the world’s largest leper colony between 1906 and 1998. (I use the word ‘leper’ begrudgingly, as it is considered taboo by many people I spoke to who have lived in such colonies.)
Leprosy was widespread for millennia throughout Asia, Africa and Europe until a cure was developed and made internationally available in the 1980s. Cases still number in the hundreds of thousands, but many of these are cured. It is a hugely stigmatizing condition, linked to dirtiness and sin when in fact it is simply a bacteriological disease. It is very hard to catch, and cannot be transmitted by touch.
From 1906 to 1910 alone, 5,303 men, women and children were transported to Culion Island. People’s lives were torn apart by this forced migration – each one of those individuals had a life, a family. Someone who would miss them. And so I decided to write a story that would put the reader at the centre of the experience, through the eyes of Ami, a girl who is taken from her mother, and wants to find her way home.
Stories are often better if you tilt the truth enough to let some imagination seep in, and so I have taken liberties with the timeline of events, names and sometimes even geography. But I have stayed true to the people and place, and have tried to show that they are never only one thing: bad people can make beautiful things; good people can make grave mistakes.
The people who came up with the idea to turn Culion into a colony weren’t evil – but they did see the inhabitants of the island as lepers before they saw them as human beings. When you reduce people to one trait – be it race, religion, who they love – and don’t step back to see the whole person, it is too easy to treat them as less than human.
You can still visit Culion Island. You can see the eagle, the church, the hospital, though the patients are long gone. It may have been known as the island of the living dead, the island of no return, or, as I have chosen to call it, the island at the end of everything. But for me, and for Ami, it was the start of everything, too.
Kiran
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To my family, who brought me kind words and nourishment as I sat at my grandparents’ table in Norfolk, frantically typing this, my second story, while the rejections for my first pinged into my inbox. Thank you for not batting an eyelid as I maniacally grinned and explained over dinner that its major themes were ‘leprosy and butterflies’. Thanks especially to my mum, Andrea, who read at least five drafts and resisted teasing me too much about my spelling.
To my friends and family around the world who bought outrageous numbers of THE GIRL OF INK & STARS, and asked when the next one was out. I’m deeply grateful. I hope you enjoyed it – especially you, Sabine!
To my beta and sensitivity readers: Andrea Millwood Hargrave, the Unruly Writers, Sarvat Hasin, Daisy Johnson, Joe Brady, Janis Cauthery, Tom de Freston, Claire Donnelly, Hazel at staybookish.net and Louise Gornall.
To the online and in-life book community who have championed me and my first book, and encouraged me with my second: Malorie Blackman, Fiona Noble, Abi Elphinstone, Claire Legrand, Lucy Lapinski, Emma Carroll, Lucy Saxon, Carrie Hope Fletcher, Anna James, Katherine Webber, Pie Corbett, Mathew Tobin, Steph Elliot, Stevie Finegan, Sally the Dark Dictator, Mariyam Khan and so many more besides (you know who you are!). To my readers, and to the booksellers who made last year the best of my life despite Brexit etc., especially James, Rebecca, Alex and Paul at Blackwells, Zoe, Dani and Rachel at Waterstones Oxford and Florentyna.
To Melinda Salisbury, who took me to see the butterflies.
To Chicken House and all who sail in her: Elinor, Kesia, Esther, Laura M, Laura S, Jazz, Rachel H and my editors Barry Cunningham and Rachel Leyshon. To Rachel Hickman and Helen Crawford-White for yet another stunning design. To my fellow Chickens: M. G. Leonard, Maz Evans, Lucy Strange, James Nicol, Ally Sherrick, Natasha Farrant, Sophia Bennett, Louise Gornall and Catherine Doyle – your books provide such escape, joy and inspiration.
To Maya and Mary Alice, partners in crime (and wine).
To Oscar, Noodle and Luna. I’ve not completely lost it – I know cats can’t read (right?) – but this book could not have been written without one or another of you purring on my lap.
To Sarvat, Daisy, Laura and Jessie – equally, without our writing outings it would not have happened. I’m still sad none of you would purr on my lap.
To everyone at Janklow & Nesbit, both UK and US. Especially to Hellie, for holding my hand through every step and being a voice I can always trust, and to Kirby, for answering every neurotic email.
Last thanks always to Tom, the inspiration for a kind child who saw the world a little differently. Thank you for reading every word of this book aloud to me and doing all the voices. So excited for future adventures with you, my husband, and ever my best friend.
Text © Kiran Millwood Hargrave 2017
First paperback edition published in Great Britain in 2017
This electronic edition published in 2017
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PB ISBN 978-1-910002-76-6
eISBN 978-1-911077-47-3