In 1808, an American merchant ship happened upon an uncharted island in the South Pacific and unwittingly solved the biggest nautical mystery of the era: the whereabouts of a band of fugitives who, after seizing their vessel, had disappeared into the night with their Tahitian companions. Seven generations later, the island is still inhabited by descendants of the original mutineers, marooned like modern castaways. In 2018 Brandon Presser went to live among its families; two clans bound by circumstance and secrets. There he pieced together Pitcairn’s full story: an operatic saga that holds all visitors in its mortal clutch – even the author. ‘This Far Land’ goes beyond the famous mutiny on the ‘Bounty’, offering an unprecedented glimpse at life on the fringes of civilization, and how, perhaps, it’s not so different from our own.