Islands at the Edge of Time: A Journey To America's Barrier Islands [Hardcover]

Gunnar Hansen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 1993

"Islands at the Edge of Time" is the story of one man's captivating journey along America's barrier islands from Boca Chica, Texas, to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Weaving in and out along the coastlines of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, and North Carolina, poet and naturalist Gunnar Hansen perceives barrier islands not as sand but as expressions in time of the processes that make them. Along the way he treats the reader to absorbing accounts of those who call these islands home -- their lives often lived in isolation and at the extreme edges of existence -- and examines how the culture and history of these people are shaped by the physical character of their surroundings.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Gunnar Hansen takes readers on a trip that no one seems to have thought of before: a 2,700-mile journey along America's sandy barrier islands from the Mexican border to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. These islands separate ocean from lagoon, saltwater from freshwater, sea bird from shore bird, and--until many were developed for tourism--sea-goer from landlubber. The barrier islands are young, Hansen tell us, formed in the last ice age only a few thousand years ago. They are also extremely vulnerable to damage, as Hurricane Emily demonstrated in 1993 when it tore away a good portion of many Atlantic islands. In his lively book, Hansen points out that the frequency and intensity of such storms seems to be on the rise, so see the islands while you can. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

The United States has some 2700 miles of barrier islands stretching from Texas to Maine. Hansen, a contributor to regional magazines ( Texas Monthly , Yankee ), explores some of these islands, starting at Boca Chico in Texas and ending on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. His journey is informative and evocative; he describes the geology of barrier islands and recounts major hurricanes that have battered them. Hansen visits Padre Island in Texas, the Delta Islands of Louisiana where the land is sinking, Dauphin and Horn Islands in Mississippi. He looks at development on Hilton Head and St. Helena in South Carolina (there is a poignant piece about tax auctions of land), then goes to Ocracoke Island in the Outer Banks. He wraps up a captivating journey with an account of the "bankers," who have survived storms but face an uncertain future with rapid development of the islands. Illustrated.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Island Press; 1 edition (August 1, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1559632518
• ISBN-13: 978-1559632515
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,910,555 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Leatherface Goes Island Hopping, August 7, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Islands at the Edge of Time: A Journey To America's Barrier Islands (Paperback)

Gunnar Hansen should have titled his book "Leatherface IV: A Grisly Journey to the Barrier Islands of America." Hansen played the saliva-spouting, prozac-needing backwoods butcher in the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and continues to bring his less-than-subtle beastly charms to B-grade horror flicks. Still, while such a cheap marketing ploy might have helped sell some more books, it wouldn't have made the writing more graceful or the observations more keen. In this account of the strange world of barrier islands, from the deserted Boca Chica in Texas to the resort islands of North Carolina, Gunnar casts his eye upon weary island dwellers, vacant-eyed tourists, and a host of natural phenomena. Unlike his maniacal alter-ego, Gunnar manages to convey a sense of desperation, as seen in the natural destruction and financial exploitation of the islands, without leaving a messy trail of blood and entrails. His account of life on the edge of America, in the great tradition of other bushy-bearded hermits like Farley Mowat and Edward Abbey, combines a sharp sense of moral direction with the softspoken wisdom of a teacher. What's really scary is that more people aren't writing books such as this

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating tale of nature and history, August 3, 2010

By 

Wynn Winberg - See all my reviews

This review is from: Islands at the Edge of Time: A Journey To America's Barrier Islands (Paperback)

I read this book about 5 years ago. It's a beautifully told tale of the history, nature and people of the barrier islands along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts. I thoroughly enjoyed it and will revisit it again.

WW

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars America's Precarious Islands, November 17, 2009

By 

Lisa Maliga "Lisa's Library of Writing" (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Islands at the Edge of Time: A Journey To America's Barrier Islands (Paperback)

I've been meaning to write more book reviews and when a prompt in my inbox wanted a response to my transaction at Amazon, I thought, why not? It's not a mega best selling title, the author isn't winning any Nobel or Pulitzer prizes, yet, and the seller was speedy in mailing this book to me.

Ok, got the seller part out of the way, now on to the book itself.

Paul Theroux is one of my favorite travel writers. He is also a fine novelist. I've read every travel book, novel and short story collection the man has ever published. As an armchair traveler, I love to read about other places. As a bookworm, I love reading works by any literate writer - known or unknown.

While Gunnar Hansen is known to many as an actor, it's his writing career that has been his preoccupation for years -- so involved was he in establishing his literary credentials that he was unaware of the status his first movie star part had garnered for him.

His past roles in horror movies had no effect on how I viewed his book. I read it slowly, absorbing the beauty of his writing style. I kept in mind that the events in the book happened in the late 1980s, long before Hurricane Katrina. His chapter simply titled "Galveston" had an essay-ish quality about it. "Wandering through the city, I knew no place to go to get a sense of the 1900 storm. There is no graveyard in Galveston to mark the storm's dead, for they had been burned or buried where the survivors found them. The city itself was the graveyard; the dead were everywhere underfoot."

Perhaps Mr. Hansen will write a screenplay about the event that preceded Katrina by a century. I believe it could be a great film.

The second chapter that could be adapted into a screenplay, is that entitled "Odd Men Out." We learn about Walter Anderson, a man born in 1903 in New Orleans who ended up being a painter. What makes him unique is that he spent more time alone on Horn Island observing his surroundings and painting, than spending it with his own family. The artist's quest in finding answers to life's big questions led him to China and almost to Tibet. Since those are intriguing subjects, I wanted to read/learn more about them.

Mr. Hansen has a way of involving himself in any situation he encounters on his island hopping adventure, but not in a boasting way. He's reportorial, stating facts, citing incidents, being a true observer. If you're looking for him to mention a single thing about his personal life, acting adventures or academic career, this isn't where you'll find it. His main reason for writing this book is to teach us about the barrier islands that surround America. We learn of the fragility of these islands, these wreaths of land that surround the mainland, how hurricanes can eliminate them, how flooding and time erodes them, and worst of all, how man is destroying them.