The Islanders | Excerpt

Shaken by problems at home, confused by the motives of a new love, and reeling from a public meltdown, high school hockey star Walt McNamara joins an exclusive new leadership program controlled by the ultra-wealthy summer residents of Whaleback Island, a granite and spruce oasis off the coast of Maine. But this is no paradise; secrets lurk in its murky waters.  As Walt and his fellow misfits, including the determined Aubrey and fierce Tess, are pushed physically and mentally by ex-military instructors, exposed truths from the island’s past and present slowly reveal the reasons behind their intense training. With danger mounting, Walt, Aubrey, Tess, and the others must use their new skills to sort friend from foe and find a way to survive.  In The Islanders, award-winning author Lewis Robinson has crafted his most irresistible book yet: a suspenseful reckoning of class conflict in America, with a vivid tale of friendship and family at its heart. 

The excerpt below is adapted from Chapter 2 of The Islanders by Lewis Robinson.

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We drifted inside the island boathouse, dark and cool and

smelling of oil and marine paint. We shouldered our packs, walked

from the floats up a ramp to a wide circle of grass where a young, tan,

blonde woman in a sun-visor and skirt sat in a golf cart, unloading

children who sprinted toward the docks.

“Welcome, welcome! Good luck!” she said, beaming, then rolled

silently forward, turning back up the hill, revealing a sign that had

been obscured by her golf cart, another hand-painted shingle on a

stake:

WILD—>

We walked up the dirt road through the Club property where

adults milled about on the manicured fairways of the golf course,

on the lawn bowling court, and on old single-speed bicycles. Some

glided around in golf carts. A few long-limbed, shaggy-haired men

with their skinny wives and daughters and sons played tennis in

tight white clothes. Labor Day was their last chance to be on the

island before jetting back to Boston or New York or wherever else.

Everyone walked with a spring in their step, and their eyes were clear.

Good sleep, fresh seafood, greens from their gardens. Ocean air.

We followed the WILD signs. I think we were all impressed by

even the small details, the stone walls being sturdy, not too neat,

lichen covered.

Aubrey ambled with purpose, head up, but totally inscrutable;

her eyes were still hidden by her wind-tangled hair. Her silence

was unnerving to me. When the trail narrowed and entered the

woods, she tucked behind me, and Tess stayed in front. The trail

was similar to the one we’d hiked on the mainland earlier—clean,

healthy terrain—though here the trees were all evergreen, the stumps

freshly cut, the path lined with woodchips. The spruce smell was so

exaggerated it seemed pumped in. Everything felt outside the realm

of flimsy plastic and scams and other cheap crap, and there were no

cars. Whaleback Island was mostly just wood and rock.

We followed the signs away from the club to the WILD campus

in the forest at the top of the island, on a hill where the trees had been

chopped down to make room for five simple cedar-shingled salt-box

buildings. The middle and tallest of them, three stories—the main

building, labeled Big Rug—was flanked by four modest dormitories.

Tacked to each front door was a typed—by typewriter—list of names.

My name wasn’t on the first list—Drake—but fourteen others and

I were on the list tacked to Cook, next door. I walked with Aubrey

and Tess to the adjacent building, Vancouver, saw their names along

with eight others on the list, and marveled at the thick white sheet

of paper inflected with the typed names:

Bethany — Alabama

Hailey — Indiana

Aubrey — Maine

Bianca — Missouri

Alexis — Florida

Kelsi – Iowa

Tess — Maryland

Kyra — Vermont

Mackenzie – Delaware

Rylee – New Mexico

Aubrey and Tess entered their dorm without saying goodbye

and the door swung shut. I didn’t like that. All I could do was walk

back to Cook, my heart pounding as I headed in past some ditched

backpacks in the stairwell. From the second floor landing, I looked

down the pine-planked hallway to an open door.

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The Islanders (Sept. 17)

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