John Ferguson is a principled man. But when, in 1843, those principles drive him to break from the established Church of Scotland, the evangelical minister soon finds himself a poor man, too. Stripped of his income, worried how he'll provide for his wife, he puts scruples aside and agrees to a lucrative but dubious mission: to sail north—armed with a pistol—and "clear" Ivar, the last remaining tenant of a forgotten island halfway between Shetland and Norway.

Ivar has lived alone for decades; the Highland Clearances (see Beyond the Book), a series of mass evictions that began a century earlier, have already forced his family from the land. But if Scottish history would have him for another victim, Clear deftly upends the usual narrative. Soon after arrival, John slips on the craggy coastline; Ivar, discovering his unconscious body, takes it upon himself to patch the minister up. In the sudden intimacy of the crofter's bothy (hut)—evoked by Davies with a tenderness as touching as it is unexpected—the difference in the men's power evaporates. They speak no common tongue, but the spark of a connection disarms them both; slowly, as the minister convalesces, each begins to decipher the other, one translated word at a time.

An obsession with language drives this slim yet gripping novel. Ivar speaks Norn, an island relative of Danish and Norwegian on the brink of extinction. To John, it's a language uniquely suited to the unforgiving surroundings; what he would call simply "a rough sea," Ivar terms "skreul," "pulter," or "yog," depending on the peculiarities of the roughness. For the Highlander—who hasn't even set eyes on another human in years—to speak and be understood by John is something close to magic: it "connect[s] their lives in the strongest possible way." Yet as the friendship deepens, so much of Clear's fascination springs from the unspoken. John's mission is never far from his thoughts. The hidden eviction notice, not to mention the pistol to enforce it, lies between the two men like an untranslatable phrase.

Language is an apt theme for an author who wields it so masterfully. Clear's chapters, each a brief, poetic vignette, are lessons in what can be achieved with spare, finely-wrought sentences. Davies is a writer with a painter's sensibility. Like the best landscape paintings, her scenes are precise in their detail and expansive in their scope; and like the best landscape painters, she has a rare sensitivity to the natural world. The prose is exquisitely earthy, her pen clearly at home digging through the peat bogs and limpet-crusted rock pools of the Northern Isles. Rain, when it falls, does so in "big, coarse drops, melting the soil into a soft brown soup"; the cold wind in its wake blows "low over the ground, making the bogs shiver." Beauty is found on every page, and rarely is a word wasted.

Less graceful, however, is the handling of history. Between the Clearances and Church schism, Davies arguably takes on more of the 19th century than her short novel can handle, and it's frustrating to see unwieldy exposition clip the wings of a writer who's already proved herself so majestic in full flight. Some finer points come to feel even more superfluous given the turns Clear takes in its final quarter. Disappointingly, those carefully assembled tensions which made the premise so compelling—how Ivar will react to his eviction and how John will see it through with his soul intact—go slack once the novel starts pulling at other concerns. That's not to say Davies's ending isn't timely or affecting, only that it arrives like the answer to a question never asked.

But these are minor quibbles about Clear's major achievements. With precision and lyricism, Davies has crafted a gentle, poignant drama. Great forces of history may convulse the mainland, but the soul of this beautiful novel curls around the hearth of the island bothy. At its core, Clear is that: two men, alone together, discovering the quiet miracle of human connection.

Reviewed by Alex Russell

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Rated 5 out of 5 by Cathryn Conroy
A Polished and Eloquent Novel with a Most Unexpected Ending That Hit Me Like a Thunderbolt
This is a perceptive, emotionally powerful novel about the agonies of change, the depths of our humanity, and the transformative power of love. And the ending? It hit me like a thunderbolt.

Masterfully written by Carys Davies, this is the story of The Rev. John Ferguson and his new wife, Mary. Although they are in their 40s, they only recently wed. The novel takes place in the wilds of Scotland in 1843 when two big events in the history of that country collide: The Great Disruption in the Scottish Church when more than 400 ministers, including the fictional John Ferguson, rebelled against the traditional Presbyterian church and broke away to form the new Free Church. In the process they gave up a way to earn a living, having to now start a new church from nothing. In addition, wealthy Scottish landowners who owned vast swaths of rural lands were forcibly evicting and displacing the longstanding residents so they could use the land for sheep. This was called the Clearances.

When John is unable to make a living as a minister, he accepts a one-time job to travel to a remote island in the far north of Scotland to evict the last remaining resident there. It's a long and arduous journey by boat, and John is greatly troubled with seasickness and fear of the water. Complicating matters, the man who lives on the island speaks only the old language, called Norn, and does not understand English. Traveling with minimal possessions, along with a gun and ammunition, John lands on the island. He finds a dilapidated cottage in which to live, and goes out exploring. He has a terrible accident, but his life is saved by the man, who is named Ivar. He is big, smelly, and quiet. And Ivar is not used to sharing his world with anyone else.

Now John is in a terrible conundrum: He must clear out Ivar, evicting him from the only home he has ever known. How can he do it? What always seemed to be a difficult task now seems impossible. Meanwhile, Ivar, who has lived in solitude for years, must integrate his life with another human being and try to understand all the confusion and joy that he feels. The power of the story is in the friendship John and Ivar form even though they can't communicate well in words.

Bonus: John valiantly attempts to learn Ivar's language, and Welsh author Carys Davies magnificently brings some of the strange words to life, including in a glossary at the end. A language and culture lost to time have a bit of a resurgence in this creative story.

This is a polished and eloquent novel with a most unexpected ending that I never saw coming.

Rated 5 out of 5 by Gloria M
Succinct and Special!
After reading the ARC of "Clear" so generously supplied by Simon and Schuster (Scribner) there is a new author on my favorites list-Carys Davies. Succinct and special, this novel eloquently and masterfully tells the tale of John Ferguson, a minister who is in financial straits due to his leaving his position with the established church of Scotland for the newly formed Free Church of Scotland and Ivar, the last remaining tenant of an island whose owners wish it to be completely cleared of humans and animals, so that they can proceed with a money making scheme involving sheep.

The eloquently written portraits of these two men, strangers who do not even speak the same language, and the beautiful descriptions of the landscapes traveled draw the reader into a narrative that slowly reveals their personalities and tragedies from their pasts and takes a journey into their unlikely friendship precipitated by an awful accident that befalls John in his attempt to earn some desperately needed funds as he traverses the island in search of the man he must evict.

Add to the plucky protagonists, Mary-John's loving wife, who bravely chooses to follow her husband's path when it becomes clear he must be in some sort of danger. Her journey is just as important and equally well crafted. This novel has a powerful ending and is ideal for lovers of historical fiction and those who favor literary fiction. Grab a copy and prepare to be enthralled!