Souvienne.
Scotland, October 1966.
Cassandra leaves London for a cabin in the Highlands, asking herself, as the train pulls away, what exactly she’s running from.
The winter comes. One January night, a half-frozen stranger knocks at her door—a young woman with a wound at her temple who remembers almost nothing, not even her own name. Cassandra calls her Souvienne, for want of anything better.
Through the long Highland winter, something quiet grows between them, until Cassandra learns: the past is not so easily left behind. Not hers.
Not Souvienne’s.
12th of October, 1966
My Dearest Brother,
I write to you from my new home, surrounded by nature in its rawest form.
The journey here was a solitary one. Since departing Glasgow a week ago, I have encountered only five souls: the train conductor, the postman (whom I fortuitously intercepted as he left the post office), and a young couple on the train accompanied by an endearing dog, a speckled pointer who bestowed upon me no small measure of tail-wagging affection.
The house stood precisely where you told me, and rest assured that I shall ask more about its history when next we meet.
In the meantime, its face is almost swallowed whole by overgrown vines and foliage, and for the first several days, I found little time to rest until I had cleared away the encroaching vegetation.
I have taken to feeding the birds, and now each morning I am roused by a symphony of chirps and trills from the sparrows and tits. The local raven remains wary of my presence, and I must admit to feeling some trepidation in the face of his formidable beak.
Otherwise it is quiet here, but not silent. The calls of owls and falcons echo through the trees, and I have spotted deer grazing in the wild. As the night comes, I secure my door and pray that the untamed wilderness will keep its distance.
Next day, I shall descend to Tyndrum to buy some provisions as the garden adjoining the house has long since surrendered to nature’s wild embrace—and to send this very letter. The nights grow colder with each passing day, and snow could fall at any moment; thus, I can delay no longer.
Yet, despite the hardships, I have not a single regret.
Yours ever, Cassandra.
This book began from a mental image of a person living alone in a forest hut. I remember walking along a street and imagining a woman leaning on the fence, looking somewhere into the distance, over the pointy tops of the evergreen pines; and I thought: what’s her story? why is she here?
The title, Souvienne, has French roots and arrived through a small misunderstanding: Cassandra hears what she hears, and a young woman who cannot even remember her own name gets a new one. Souvienne, from se souvenir, to remember, was the one thing Souvienne could not do.
If Souvienne reached you, it will be re-issued in 2026. In the meantime, I will be posting short fiction monthly starting August.