Undiscovered Scotland

 

This lovely little book is part of the Pictorial Souvenir series from Ness Publishing which between them cover many of the more scenically inspiring areas of Scotland with titles like Ross and Cromarty, Royal Deeside, Aberdeenshire, and The Isle of Skye.

The formula for each book is similar, with a brief introductory text leading you into the photographs themselves, each of which comes with a detailed caption telling you what you are looking at. A book of photographs stands or falls on the quality of the photographs it contains. The photographs that make up Northern Argyll, A Pictorial Souvenir are very good, and the care that has clearly gone into selecting a set that are varied in approach and which show off the best that the area has to offer is impressive.

What you get from the book will depend on how much you already know about the area it covers. The photographs are ordered geographically, starting with the lochs, mountains and glens of the far north of Argyll. You then travel south to Oban before, as in real life, making the crossing to Mull and Iona. The Islands of Seil and Easdale follow, and then you move through mainland Argyll once more to Kilmartin, before leaping to Loch Lomond and then back to Inveraray and concluding in Lochgilphead. The end result is an ideal primer for anyone simply wanting to get a feel for what Argyll is like: or for those who already know the area a chance to see which attractions you have overlooked or which viewpoints need visiting.

What on the surface appears to be, and is called, A Pictorial Souvenir, is easy to dismiss as of interest only to visitors to Scotland, to be purchased alongside the shortbread and the whisky miniature. On closer examination it turns out to be of interest to a much wider audience because, at the risk of repetition, of the quality of the photography it contains.