Sandstone Press is an independent publishing house based in Dingwall in the Scottish Highlands. Its list includes fiction, history, biography, outdoor activities and books in Gaelic.
Sandstone Press has also begun to publish foreign titles translated into English.
Loch Croispol Bookshop and Sandstone Press are working together to provide you with quality literature at affordable prices.
When ordering titles online you can take advantage of this promotion by including the words
Sandstone Press in in the "Comments" Section of your order, and we will apply the 10% discount.
Women are dying in their millions. Some blame scientists, some see the hand of God, some see human arrogance reaping the
punishment it deserves. Jessie Lamb is an ordinary girl living in extraordinary times: as her world collapses, her idealism
and courage drive her towards the ultimate act of heroism. If the human race is to survive, it's up to her.
But is Jessie heroic? Or is she, as her father fears, impressionable, innocent, incapable of understanding where her
actions will lead?
Set just a month or two in the future, in a world irreparably altered by an act of biological terrorism, The Testament of
Jessie Lamb explores a young woman's determination to make her life count for something, as the certainties of her
childhood are ripped apart.
Site Works
The Ness and Struie Drainage Project
Robert Davidson
In the corner of the door lintel a cobweb shone like silver. Like me the spider works through instinct. It just gets up and
gets on with the job without thought. Every so often it turns out something perfect.
On a wind lashed coast in the far north a group of men assemble on a construction site. The Ness and Struie Drainage
Project will dominate their lives for the next few months as they toil through the daylight hours and into the night,
endure hardship and conflict and – mostly - survive. Within the compound and fencelines a new, temporary world will form,
bounded by sea, mountains and sky. Site Works is the story of the men and their work, transients creating something
permanent and greater than they know.
The Sea Detective
Mark Douglas-Home
'Help me, please help me.' It was a young woman's voice, pleading with him. He opened
the door, certain this was the biggest mistake of his life, and there she was, a feral creature
in dirty clothes, with hollowed cheeks and scabs on her cracked lips. Her closest friend died
three years ago, her body fished out of the sea off the Argyll coast, and she believes only
Cal can help her find out what happened.
This is not the only unexplained death haunting Cal McGill, a part-time PhD oceanography
student with a macabre interest in floating corpses. Severed feet are washing ashore on
Scotland's beaches and McGill wants to know if they're wearing trainers. The answer could
make all the difference between accident and murder. Then there's the tragedy of his
grandfather who was lost at sea, the mystery which sparked his childhood fascination for
tracking flotsam across oceans, the mystery he's now determined to solve
Ever Fallen In Love
Zoë Strachan
Richard fell for Luke at university. Luke was handsome, dissolute, dangerous; together they
did things that Richard has spent the last decade trying to forget
Now his career is on the brink of success, but his younger sister Stephie's life is in pieces.
Her invasion of Richard's remote west coast sanctuary forces Richard to confront the
tragedy and betrayal of his past, and face up to his own role in what happened back then.
In this compelling, visceral tale of how not to fit in, Zoë Strachan takes us on a journey
through hedonistic student days to the lives we didn't expect to end up living, and the
hopes and fears that never quite leave us.
To Ride The Mountain Winds
Leslie Symons
To Ride the Mountain Winds, possibly the first history of aerial mountaineering to span the
whole period from the 18th century to the present day, is written for everyone interested
in the history of mountaineering and also those interested in the history of aviation and
the limits to which pilots have pushed their machines and their skills. This should include
not only climbers and flyers but also those airline passengers who, while sipping a gin
and tonic in the luxury of a modern airliner, far above the shining snows, have paused to
wonder what might happen if their jet-propelled magic carpet were forced suddenly to
descend among them. Few will have pondered the connections between the histories of
mountaineers and aviators but their interaction is almost as old as either.
Cairngorm John
John Allen
The Cairngorms in Scotland are a mountain range, a hard reality, a unique and sensitive
environment, a playground, a sanctuary, an idea.
They are also a magnet for climbers and walkers who occasionally come to grief. The
Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team operates across a vast, landlocked area that includes
not only two of the three great plateaux but also Ben Alder to the south and the Dava
Moorlands to the north. John Allen was a member between 1972 and 2007 and Team
Leader from 1989 until his retirement. Throughout that period his call name when speaking
to RAF and Navy rescue helicopters was CAIRNGORM JOHN.
CAIRNGORM JOHN is introduced by Sir Chris Bonington who describes it as, '. . . by turns
exciting, funny, informative and wise, an indispensible addition to the literature of the mountains.'
Hamish's Mountain Walk
Hamish Brown
Hamish Brown was the first walker and climber to complete the Munros in a single round.
By his own rules he did it self-powered except where ferries were required, and with the
aid of his trusty fold away bike. The year was 1974, and the roads of Scotland carried only
a fraction of the traffic they do today, wind farms were unheard of, crofting more vibrant,
and a strong Scottish mountaineering tradition was already established.
Four years later Hamish's Mountain Walk appeared and was an immediate success, inspiring
not only climbers but also readers fascinated by the history, geology, plant life and lore of
one of Europe's most unspoiled regions. Many have followed in Hamish's boot prints, but
no following author could bring the same freshness and few could touch the depth of his
knowledge and experience. This is an inspirational classic of the outdoors.
Hamish's Groats End Walk
Hamish Brown
The second of Hamish Brown's classic trio of outdoor books, Hamish's Groats End Walk
appears with a new introduction, appendices and two sections of colour pictures. First
published thirty years ago this wonderful period piece tells the story of what happened after
Hamish's Mountain Walk when Hamish took to the outdoors and writing full time.
With his faithful companion, the Shetland collie Storm, he wandered from John O'Groats to
Land's End over 175 days in 1979, taking in the first ever walk between the highest summits
of Scotland, England, Wales and Ireland besides completing a sixth round of the Munros,
canoe-running the River Forth, and traversing many of the best hills in the four countries.
Hamish's Groats End Walk has been carefully revised but remains the same vivid journal,
with day-to-day snapshots of people and places, of history and legend to which has now
been added an historical perspective.
Cogadh Ruaraidh
Iain MacLean
Iain Maclean's Cogadh Ruairidh (Ruairidh's War) is an account of the first day of the Battle
of the Somme through the eyes and the experience of a Highland soldier, Ruairidh, and
his two friends.
MacLean first describes the waiting period, when the soldiers' emotions swing
between tedium and high tension, fear and naïve overconfidence, and then, clearly and
dispassionately, what the three men encounter as they go over the top and advance
towards the enemy trenches – and the waiting machine guns.
The novel follows Ruairidh through his convalescence in France and his journey home,
where he struggles to come to terms with what has happened on that awful day. Cogadh
Ruairidh is a powerful evocation of one of the grimmest days in the history of modern
warfare. As an indictment of the brutality and futility of war, it is all the more effective for
the fact that MacLean lets the events speak for themselves.
Cleasan A Bhaile Mhoir
Catriona Lexy Campbell
Jessie is an aspiring actress who has moved to London to try to make a breakthrough into
the big time but is finding the going tough. She has to work in a hotel to make ends meet
and is about give up when she stumbles, with the help of her friend Curtis, on a novel way
of using her acting talents for gain.
Jessie's series of imaginative 'scenarios', designed to help her clients through sticky patches
in their lives, are brought alive vividly in this entrancing tale.
In Cleasan a' Bhaile Mhòir, Catriona Lexy Campbell has created a wide range of interesting
characters and their relationships, which she describes with humour and not a little insight.
There are also exciting incidents which help carry the story along at a gripping pace. And
underlying it all is a tender, understated love story.
San Dùthaich Ùir
Alison Lang
Anna recalls how her father told her stories about the family's long journey from the old
country to the safety of the new country. She has already noticed how hard her mother has
to work, while her father seems to do nothing but sit at home reading. Anna is fascinated
by Aunt Marguerite's jewellery box, and tales of her former career as an opera singer.
At the age of five, Anna is sent to school in a second-hand uniform. Her brother Frederick
is supposed to take care of her but leaves her to fend for herself. With both children at
school, their mother gets a job in a factory and works long hours as the household's sole
breadwinner. Anna's father and Marguerite do little to help, and Anna begins to take on
domestic duties at home
Frederick, now ten years old, gets in trouble with the law. Anna eavesdrops on her parents'
conversation with the policeman who has brought Frederick home. So engrossed is Anna
in the conversation that she fails to notice Marguerite's jewellery box lying unlocked, and
she misses her chance to look inside.
More than fifty years later, Anna discovers Marguerite's jewellery box and prepares to open it.
'Loch Croispol Bookshop, Restaurant & Gallery has, since its inception in 1999,
received many plaudits, including recommendations in various travel guides such as "The Rough Guide",
"The Lonely Planet Guide" and "The Creaky Traveller". The shop and its proprietors,
Kevin Crowe and Simon Long, have also been featured in "The Herald" - one of Scotland's most
prestigious daily broadsheets, "Scots Magazine", and various other journals. Kevin writes book
reviews for the Scottish Highlands magazine "Am Bratach".
'We specialise in Scottish titles, but we also have a large general stock. We pride
ourselves on being able to source any in print title, and we also offer a book search service for out of print
titles.
Balnakeil Bay, about half a mile from our shop.
'We are located in one of the most remote parts of the Scottish mainland, on the
northwest edge of the country, and over 100 miles from the nearest city. We are surrounded by beaches,
cliffs, lochs, moors and mountains, and an array of wild life ranging from whales and dolphins to puffins
and eagles to rare orchids.
'From Easter to the end of September we are open 7 days a week, and from October to
Easter we are open five days a week.'
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