THE HOUSE OF LOCHAR NEWSLETTER : February 2012

REVISED PRICES .... mostly downwards! We have concentrated our warehousing and distribution within our own premises in the Isle of Colonsay and we now intend to offer our own titles at a most competitive price.

More than sixty of our best-selling titles have been re-priced and in the majority of cases we can now offer them at a much lower price. Please browse through our list... since all our prices are "post free within the UK" they will rise, inevitably, with the cost of postage. We believe that the next postal increase is due in April 2012, so do try to order before it happens.

We will be distributing our new, hard-copy catalogue quite shortly and are striving for early publication of both "The Byrnes and the O'Byrnes" Vol 4 and the facsimile edition of "The Book of Colonsay and Oronsay" by Symington Grieve, Vols 1 and 2. Further details follow asap.

We have received Planning Permission to open a retail shop within our main premises in Colonsay and it will be stocked with the cream of Scottish publications. We hope to create an additional on-line shop in the near future, offering interesting books and ephemera from a variety of sources.

An example of our new prices: one of our finest publications ever was "Jack B Yeats: A Vision of Ireland" by John Booth; this is a magnificent volume and was originally published at £35.00 plus postage. Single copies can now be found on offer at up to £140.00 - which is a puzzle to us, because we still have almost 100 copies in stock from the original edition. So, we have spent a little time producing a special section on this site which gives full details of the work - and we are now offering our remaining copies at a bargain price of £15.00 to include FREE postage within the UK. This really is an extraordinarily fine book - please have a look at it here. Be sure to scroll down - we reproduce no less than 10 of the 67 paintings which are featured in the book; even if you do not buy a copy, you will enjoy looking.

Here is another example - A Summer in Lochaber by Catriona Fforde, only £8.99, post-free

The adventurer or keen cyclist would enjoy In Quest of Livingstone by Colum Wilson and Aisling Irwin; an amazing adventure, only £5.99, post-free

We have a number of biographical and genealogical works - for example The Lithuanians in Scotland by John Millar is a brilliant and sensitive account of an important immigrant community. If you have always heard good reports of Keir Hardie or believed in a Socialist ideal, read this - it will make your toes curl. Only £6.99 post-free.

As mentioned above, we are to publish a tribute edition of "Colonsay and Oronsay" (2 Vols.) by Symington Grieve, together with a brief biographical introduction. With the exception of the introduction, it will be a facsimile edition, hardbound and in two volumes. We are most grateful to all members of the late author's family, who have given their blessing to the project. The author spent more than fifty years in visiting and studying these islands and he recorded many traditions and minutiae that would otherwise have been lost. Copies of the original edition cost hundreds of pounds - every effort will be made to make the new edition affordable whilst maintaining the quality and feel of the original. We hope to publish by Easter 2012.