Redemption: A Novel

By Xlibris US

REDEMPTION

Callum Mor, the epic main character, takes the reader on a deep Hero's Journey. It opens with his childhood in the Hebrides, islands off the NW coast of Scotland. He draws wonderful mentors to him; his schoolteacher, who lights the spark of a bard in him, animal friends such as an otter, a brutal fisherman who shields his darkness from the boy as he matures. Callum Mor thrives despite the poverty of his home in an island nurturing with gentle humor and adventure. This novel moves from the rhapsody of Callum Mor's idyllic childhood through tragedies to the derelict zone of his alcoholic drowning out of pain and suffering, then finally into a state of awakening he remained in for the rest of his life.

His father, a seaman longing to be at home, is driven to madness by his inability to create a place for himself on the island. His brother is murdered on the docks at Montreal. So Callum Mor stays with his mother and forgets his yearnings to be a writer. He becomes the best fisherman in the region before grave misunderstandings tear his love, Catriona, away from him. This displaces his gifts as he drives himself and his crew to the very limits of endurance. The manner of his mother's death is the final straw. Callum Mor's sensitivities snap and he enters the dark zone of alcoholism and withdraws from society. With only his animals keeping him this side of sanity he survives in a bleak solitude. Until a family with a small girl seeking refuge from a storm come to his house. Slowly he edges away from his self-destruction. He saves the girl's life in a winter blizzard. The glimmer of awakening dawns in him while sheltering in a cave with the child warmly ensconced in the gutted carcass of a sheep he killed to keep her from freezing. He sees his life pass in front of his eyes and is grateful that his journey brought him to such insight. This sets the stage for the final drama that illuminates the resilience of the human spirit.

"Redemption" is my thirteenth book and first novel, though actually the first book I ever wrote. Written in 1975, it was soon forgotten, as I was unable to get it published at that time. This "Lost" manuscript was rediscovered the spring of 2011 and then refined. I found it in an old filing cabinet, read it through and could scarce believe it. I requested my wife and a couple of friends with critical eyes to read it through, just in case I was dreaming. Modern technology enabled the yellowing typed manuscript to be transformed into a computer ready document. My wife thought it was incredible; one friend could not put it down and mused about the film to be made; the other friend cried through most of it. All of which encouraged me to bring "Redemption" to life. I was tempted to leave this gem from 1975 in its pristine state, but realized that my insights some forty years later could enhance the narrative and flesh out "Callum Mor" into a character of epic proportions.

The story is an allegory for the life difficulties I experienced at that time 40 years ago. The surprise for me was how could I have written such a book while in a desperate state of mind? I was a real mess with a failing marriage in the Hebrides and trying to keep a career going at Carleton University in Canada. I was not doing a good job with either. Publishing this book in 2014 was an imperative for me, as a necessary part of my own life-journey. It is a companion to Trailing Sky Six Feathers also published in 2014. These books are writing me.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 23, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499012309

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by IAN PRATTIS.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2014907938

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-4990-1232-3

                Softcover         978-1-4990-1234-7

                eBook              978-1-4990-1230-9

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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CONTENTS

Praise For Redemption

Publications By Ian Prattis

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Epilogue

Glossary Of Terms

The Author

PRAISE FOR REDEMPTION

Lucille Hildesheim, International Harp Artiste

What marks a great work of art is that it touches the heart and soul. Redemption touched mine very deeply. It is so vividly descriptive of both scenery and people, drawing you into the life of Callum Mor, making you cry for him, cheer for him, and wishing you could continue on his journey with him. It is a book to be read over and over again, from which to take away life lessons and inspiration for our own personal journey. This is a book to share with those who touch your life.

Mary Helen Dean, Management Professional, Ottawa, Canada

I loved this book, captivating on so many levels, as the story reinforced my resolve. I have three criteria for a good book… I don’t want it to end, I love the end, and I do not wish to speak to anyone for several hours after I finish it. So, this met my criteria on all these levels!

Anita Rizvi, Consultant, Ottawa, Canada

Redemption is a riveting novel chronicling one man’s journey through the stages of innocence, darkness, destruction and transformation. The narrative may be applied both individually and universally. Individuals are suffering all over the world from the chaos that life brings, be it violence, abuse of power, cheating, torture or the destruction that comes with war. What is so exquisite about this novel is the tenderness and honesty with which the author deals with the human condition. Callum Mor draws us in as he demonstrates an intuitive understanding and respect for nature. We are intrigued by his innocence and purity which contrast so strongly with the tragic failings that surround him. When Callum Mor’s journey moves him even closer to the abyss, the author refuses to sanitize his experiences. Rather, they are put out there as graphically and tragically as they occur. The story pulls you in and before you know it, the reader is seduced and becomes Callum Mor. As he is redeemed, so are we. Redemption is so beautifully written, exploring the human condition in its entirety, even the darkest elements. The author does this with grace, elegance, compassion and without judgment.

Tina Fedeski, Executive Director of Orkidstra Canada and founder of The Leading Note Foundation.

A magical journey of the struggle towards hope, inspiration and love.

Jo Anne Denis, retired federal public servant from the Government of Canada.

Thank you for the gift of your book, Redemption. It is a lovely read. Elegantly sad. We all have a piece of Callum Mor in us. I certainly identified with many aspects of his journey. So thank you for the enjoyable hours reading about this fine human being.

PUBLICATIONS BY IAN PRATTIS

•   Anthropology at the Edge: Essays on Culture, Symbol, and Consciousness

•   The Essential Spiral: Ecology and Consciousness After 9/11

•   Failsafe: Saving the Earth from Ourselves

•   Earth My Body, Water My Blood

•   Trailing Sky Six Feathers: One Man’s Journey with His Muse

•   Eight e-books 2011–2012 on Amazon Kindle

•   Two CDs

•   Two DVDs

•   Four films

•   One hundred professional articles/chapters/book reviews published in world journals

•   Ten scientific and technical reports

•   Twenty-six electronic publications of television courses broadcast at Carleton University and by TVO

•   Fifty articles in Pine Gate, an online Buddhist journal

•   One hundred fifty articles in newspapers and community magazines

www.ianprattis.com

This is a story, a piece of fiction.

It springs from the imagination and thoughts of its author. It’s unfolding is not a portrayal of people living or dead. It is a song, an essay, a hymn to the human spirit.

CHAPTER ONE

L OBSTER. NO LOBSTER. No Lobster. Crabs. Lobster. Crabs. No Lobster. Like a medieval incantation, old Angus sang out the greeting as the lobster creels came over the gunwale one by one. Lobster. No Lobster. Crab. Uttered with the exact same pitch and feeling, he intoned a greeting to the creature trapped within. His huge hands deftly unlaced the latticed side of the creel, and with a slow rhythm, he methodically passed the lobsters to a boy standing on the deck of the boat. The youngster watched in silence while the lobsters transferred from the gnarled hands of Angus to a large wooden box covered with a wet sack. He watched in fascination as Angus tore claws, shells, and legs from the living crab to place the breast meat in the creel as bait along with half a salt mackerel.

When the whole fleet of twenty creels were stacked on the deck, the skipper of the boat, Michael Martin, shouted above the noise of the engine to Angus that they were moving. If the old man heard, he did not acknowledge, but peered bemusedly at the sea as the Atlantic swell rocked the boat in its turning. He looked at the sky noticing the flight of gulls, then to the Atlantic sweeping unremittingly from Labrador to break on his own Hebridean shores. A vast oceanic journey with its own rhythms, dangers, and joys. Angus was well attuned to the many moods of the Atlantic Ocean. He looked to the water for signs that would tell him if the currents would be stronger or weaker than he anticipated. With a short slow movement of his hand, he bade the skipper move closer to a reef, white spumed from the breakers. Then once the spot was chosen, he again motioned to Michael to describe a large semicircle as he cast the baited creels one by one back into the sea.

This was the fourth fleet of twenty creels to be serviced that September morning. Michael took the boat out to sea then cut the engine. The craft moved up and down with the swell of the ocean. The remaining fleets of lobster creels could wait while their leisurely lunch was consumed. Michael glanced fondly at the boy, his nephew, Callum Mor.

The boy’s day had started early, just after dawn. He had risen while his parents slept, drawn by something intangible about the quietness of the morning. Leaving his snoring brother whose bed he shared, he tiptoed past the back room where his elder sister muttered and turned in her sleep. He shivered as he pulled on his sweater and trousers in the cold kitchen. He took a cup of milk from the pitcher by the scullery and left the cup on the table. His mother would notice and know that he had gone. He made up the fire and put a match to it to take the chill from the kitchen for the rest of his family. Then he was drawn to the day.

Closing the croft house door behind him, he stood and marveled at the beauty of the morning spread out for him to see. The slow aftermath of dawn could be traced in a sky streaked with reds and grays as though a child had smeared pastels on the horizon. He walked from his father’s croft house, skirting the bay and climbing the hill that led to a sight of the pier. Here and there a light showed from a croft house but no one was about. This hour of the morning belonged to him and to the sheep—sheep sleeping in the middle of the road, belching and coughing in the sparse pasture opposite the post office. Their dominance uninterrupted by merchants opening up shop, too early for children to run to school shouting and laughing, too early for the first drunk to take up his station by the lifeboat shed. The sheep commanded this hour of the day and stared diffidently while the boy walked among them.

Two ringnetter boats with their crew asleep below lay at anchor in the lee of the breakwater. The clamor of gulls around them gave vocal testimony to the remains of last night’s catch. The boy counted the small boats clustered by the slipway then made his way to the pier. The sea here was calm and flat as glass, scarcely responding to the whisper of breeze that brushed it. The boy spat into the water and watched the ever-increasing number of rings on the calm surface. He spat again, this time to the left so the two sets of rings would collide, fuse, and break on the pier’s pilings. Small patches of oil drifted past like multicolored jellyfish. In his waiting, he scanned the pier and took in the fishing nets hung on rails and piled in disarray among discarded warp lines and fuel drums. Large red containers with MacAlpines Shipping as their scutcheon, sat dully amidst the reminders of the island’s fishing fleet.

He picked up the noise of a diesel engine and stared out to sea, straining his attention to catch the shape of the boat. He knew the sound of the boat, yet still peered anxiously until the familiar outlines of his uncle’s fishing boat could be picked out to the south. His uncle lived on a neighboring island, yet came to this pier for fuel and stores. The boy willed the boat to come faster, before the village stirred, before his sister, Moira, with her quiet insistence took him along with herself to school. He had been promised a trip on the boat, and today, he wanted to go. He looked anxiously to the village, at the first stirrings of life there, at the church clock that showed that he would not be spared Moira’s insistence.

The wash at the bow of the boat grew bigger as his figure stood on the pier drawing it closer to him. Then the postmaster, idling by the railings, filling his pipe before his day of commerce began, saw him and waved. The boy reluctantly acknowledged the salute. The merchant’s children in a rush descended the pier road and took the shortcut to the school. They laughed and waved good-naturedly at the boy’s strange figure on the pier. His own brother shouted from the hill to get along to school, and still the boat was far off. Then Moira was before him, an amused quietness in her eyes, and he allowed himself to be pulled into the way of things and reluctantly followed her to school.

He felt his uncle’s gaze on him and turned to him with an uncertain smile. Michael looked bemusedly at the boy and then laughed You’re a wee bugger, Callum Mor, jumping school the day. What will your teacher do when she gets hold of you, eh?

Why but she saw me, and she smiled at me as I took the shortcut to the pier. His teacher had smiled. Callum Mor’s attention had been riveted on his uncle’s boat at the pier, which he could see from the schoolroom window. He had moved cautiously from desk to desk until he was close to the schoolroom door, an advancement that Ms. MacDougall had not been unaware of. Then she gave him his chance by turning to the blackboard, and out of the class slipped Callum Mor, down the brae, through the cut to the pier where Michael and Angus were standing smoking. His classmates giggled quietly, stifling their mirth behind fists over their mouths until silenced by a frown from Ms. MacDougall. She walked to the back of the class and looked out of the window that commanded the bay and the pier. The morning sun cast a sheen on the water that was scarcely rippled by the wind coming from the west. Several trawlers had tied up at the pier, and their crews were busy taking on ice and sorting their catch for the market on the mainland.

Ms. MacDougall smiled to herself. It was a day for freedom if anyone would take it. Callum Mor’s slight figure had paused at the school gate and as he cast a glance back at the school he caught Miss MacDougall’s smile on him. He stood stock still, unsure of retreat or flight. He was no stranger to her ruler across his knuckles and switch on his backside, yet she was there looking at him and smiling. She turned from the window tugging at the chignon at the back of her hair, an unnecessary severity to her features. She was happy for Callum Mor, just as Michael and Angus were happy for him once he presented himself to them at the pier.

Callum Mor did not understand his teacher. He exulted in his release, knowing of the punishment awaiting him the next day at school. He did not know of the happiness he gave to others, could never know. He lived an extraordinary life yet thought nothing of it. His gifts were apparent to everyone he touched, but not to him. That came much later in the grand, often tragic, cycle of his life journey. For now, he was a little boy taking a day off from school. Michael and Angus stopped in their smoking at the pier and looked at the boy as he shyly stood by them. A small slip of nothing, elflike and ephemeral, with eyes that were too knowing and too vulnerable. There was too much in that small frame, and everyone who knew him sensed it and rejoiced in it, yet feared for him. This was why he was called Callum Mor. Callum, the Large One. While Michael wondered, old Angus nodded to the boy to get aboard. This was his first time on the boat and as it pulled away from the pier he felt like a bird soaring with wings wide open.

Michael’s gaze on the boy was fond. Lunch over, Angus and Michael talked about their catch and where the remaining fleets of creels would be placed. Callum Mor sat quietly looking at them. He had shared their sandwiches, supped from Angus’s large mug, and listened to their talk of the sea. They did not explain anything to him. He learned by listening and watching and then doing. His left hand was ugly and red with two large welts suffered from lobster nips. He had borne the pain in silence, but his tears had been noticed by the two men. They had said nothing, but at their lunch made room for him and treated him with a gentle courtesy that he did not understand, but which he shyly treasured. Angus sat on a fish box filling his pipe, his pale blue eyes rarely away from the sea that sustained him. His weathered features and great broad shoulders and hands a contrast to the slight eager-faced boy beside him. Michael started the engine, and the boat swung south to the islands at the tip of the Hebridean tail. He slowed the vessel as they approached an inlet close to