Book, map and audio shop You can order books, maps, music and other materials associated with Harris, the Western Isles and even Scarista House itself, direct from these pages via Amazon‘s secure server.

The Highlands and the Hebrides continue to be associated in literature with a strong sense of idyll, and this is reflected in some of the books here and on the next page. All too often it is an idyll found and then lost, or destroyed by hubris or other weaknesses. In extreme cases it amounts to a kind of ecstasy which shines from the page, and which I remember from my first visits here. Luckily I still experience it from time to time, and see it in the faces of our visitors, some of whom arrive holding one or more of these books.

Book, map and audio shop

You can order books, maps, music and other materials associated with Harris, the Western Isles and even Scarista House itself, direct from these pages via Amazon's secure server.

Not just a great recipe book but also a fantastic guide to the best new Scottish restaurants, from Orkney to the Borders and taking in Scarista House on the way. My nose isn't as red as it looks in the photo.

"Scotland's fine natural ingredients combined with such imaginative recipes from inventive chefs" Michel Roux

Order Scotland on a Plate or read more about it

Finlay J. Macdonald grew up between the wars on a croft a few yards from Scarista House. His memories of childhood include visits to the house (then the church Manse) and schooldays across the road. A wealth of detail of island life is delivered with humour, insight and a poetic turn of phrase against a backdrop of the flower-strewn landscape of Harris.

Scarista Beach can be seen in the top right hand corner of the jacket photo.

The book has been broadcast as a series of talks on Radio 4, and was dramatised on BBC television in 2001. Some scenes were filmed at Scarista House.

Order The Crowdie and Cream Trilogy or find out more

Alison and Andrew Johnson turned a rat-infested near-ruin into the internationally acclaimed hotel which is now Scarista House. This book tells how they did it and has inspired many people to visit Harris for the first time. It also deals frankly with some of the disillusionments they faced. The chapter Guests and Pests is brutally funny... Fawlty Towers only had one Major but Alison faced three. Scarista Style includes lots of Alison's recipes and explores the ethics of food sourcing.

We both re-read this book when we were buying the house and were terrified by it. I was, however, surprised by the extent to which my own ethos of food sourcing and animal welfare had been informed by my first reading of it many years ago. And by how shockingly funny the behaviour of the three Majors was.

Andrew now runs boat trips in the Sound of Harris.

Order A House on the Shore or read more about it

The big one. Fantastic pictures, fantastic recipes, fantastic setting, fantastic Rosemary. Rosemary has now left Amhuinnsuidhe Castle and conducts her cookery school at Swinton Park in Yorkshire. We miss her.

This book says all there is to say about the most beautiful atmosphere and food in the perfect location - Harris, of course.

Order Rosemary: Castle Cook or read more about it