A Calendar of Love, by George Mackay Brown (Flamingo, £5,99 in UK)

Fishermen, crofters, and heavy-drinking, strong-silent-types throng the pages of this first collection of stories by novelist, playwright and poet George Mackay Brown, originally published in 1967. Set in his native Orkney Islands, and ranging across the centuries, they capture the drama of witch trials, priest hunts, Viking raids, legends and folklore and above all, the stark beauty of the landscape. Delicately written in a rich poetic diction. laced with archaisms and terms drawn from Scots and Old Norse dialects, these are quietly effective - and affecting - tales of love, loss, disappointment and small, bitter, consolations.