Our Sable Island Home opens on April 23, 1951 as the O’Hara family board the Edward Cornwallis in Halifax with all their worldly possessions. They were bound for the famous (and isolated) sandbar in the Atlantic where Ernest O’Hara was to take up duties as a wireless operator.

The back cover states that “the book tells stories that bring to life the hardships, worries, desperation, fears and uncertainties that come with such isolation.”

Our Sable Island Home delivers what it says. Yet in spite of being ill-equipped to handle every misfortune, (and there were heartbreaking situations), the story never gets mired in pity or regret. It’s a casual, conversational read that is interspersed with information about island life through the eyes of Sharon and Mary O’Hara, ages six and seven.

Bonus: there’s a lovely chapter that includes an endearing letter from the authors’ father to their mother, 33 years after they left Sable Island.

Our Sable Island Home
by Sharon O’Hara with Mary O’Hara
$19.95, paperback, 176 pp.
Pottersfield Press, November 2014