Extraordinary story. Extraordinary work. Extraordinary family. And brilliantly told. ( )

Fascinating study into both the history of lighthouse building (primarily in Scotland) and into the family that built the lighthouses and produced Robert Louis Stevenson.

Worthwhile account of the remarkable Stevenson family, who were responsible for building some of the most important lighthouses, around the Scottish coastline. ( )

Amazing story of perseverance against the odds in constructing lighthouses in wild and inhospitable locations. The accounts of men quarrying into solid rock, having to stop for each tide, and sometimes only being able to work a few days because of the weather, is a real eye-opener into the working conditions of the time. Technology also plays a part, with the initial development of reflectors, and then lenses, alongside developments in the construction of the towers themselves. If we think we live hectic lives today, read about the punishing schedules of the Stevenson family, and how much they fitted into a year...!

This is as much a hymn to Scottish lighthouses as a biography of the family who built them. As the author acknowledges in the introduction, this can't be a complete biography of the Stevenson family, that would simply be too long. Instead it concentrates on those members who built the lighthouses and looks at the lighthouses they built. The complicating factor is that one of their number wasn't an engineer, he was Robert Louis Stevenson and he's famous for an entirely different sphere of work. He wrote a book about his family, and that is referenced, several times.
Individually the Stevensons are a mixed lot, some are nicer than others, some are more suited to being an engineer of this kind than others, but they all manage to be interesting, and the tales of the lighthouses they built (and which still stand) are on a common theme, but all present with different challenges.
The book does tail off, with the next generation being introduced, but they are not followed beyond their youth. I didn't realise that (at the time of writing) lighthouses were still being built, with three being added in recent years for the oil tankers that ply the North sea.
This manages to be interesting and informative about quite a specialist subject. It sets their achievements against the technical and social background of the task at hand and describes how the issues were overcome. It is limited in scope to just those of the family with a part in the family business, but it acknowledges that at the start - a complete biography of 4 generations of a family would be extensive. This is well worth reading. ( )