This Other Eden: A tale of paradise gained – and lost

PAUL Harding’s This Other Eden opens with an epigraph telling us that in 1912, the residents of a small mixed-race community – deemed “degenerate” by mainlanders – were forcibly evicted from their island home in the US state of Maine.

While this historical injustice serves as the inspiration for his Booker Prize-nominated novel, its focus isn’t solely tragic. Rather, much of its imaginative energy is gathered towards envisioning the lives and workings within a community that, untouched by mainland prejudices, is animated by a spirit of egalitarianism and unconditional love.