Gavin Francis

An Observer, New Statesman, Financial Times, Irish Times and Scotsman 2021 Non-Fiction Highlight 'Searing yet beautiful ... less a hot take than an astute manifesto for what matters most in life, as well as in medicine.' - Rachel Clarke, author of Breathtaking: Inside the NHS in a Time of Pandemic and Your Life in My Hands 'Well written, often entertaining...

In Island Dreams, Gavin Francis examines our collective fascination with islands. He blends stories of his own travels with psychology, philosophy, and great voyages from literature, shedding new light on the importance of islands and isolation in our collective consciousness. Comparing the life of freedom of thirty years of extraordinary travel from the Faroe Islands to the Aegean, from the...

In a world increasingly preoccupied by borders, bridges celebrate the possibility of connection, allowing the flow of goods, people and ideas. Bridges are among our grandest physical structures with the power of transforming lives and economies, but we also stand (or fall) upon the simple arch of bones in our feet. Text is a bridge between writer and reader, and...

Driven by a yearning to experience the vast skies and frozen beauty of the North, Gavin Francis goes in search of the people living along the northern limits of Europe. From the first Greek explorers to the Vikings to modern polar adventurers, he travels through history and legend to find out why—and how—we are drawn to the North. Francis's encounters...

WINNER OF THE SCOTTISH BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD Shortlisted for the Costa Biography Prize, RSL Ondaatje Prize, Banff Adventure Travel Prize and Saltire Book of the Year AwardBook of the Year for the Financial Times, Sunday Herald, ScotsmanA travel book pick for the Sunday Times and the National GeographicGavin Francis spent fourteen months in one of the remotest places...

SHORTLISTED FOR WATERSTONES BOOK OF THE YEAR In Island Dreams, Gavin Francis combines stories of his own travels with psychology, philosophy and myth, shedding new light on the importance of islands and isolation in our collective consciousness. Francis draws on thirty years of island adventures from the Faroe Islands to the Aegean, from the Galapagos to the Andaman Islands. He...

When it comes to illness, sometimes the end is just the beginning. Recovery and convalescence are words that exist at the periphery of our lives—until we are forced to contend with what they really mean. Here, GP and writer Gavin Francis explores how—and why—we get better, revealing the many shapes recovery takes, its shifting history and the frequent failure of...