The descriptions of the landscape and Aina and Whitney’s relationship as it begins to break down are so well and subtly described. I would throw a few questions at her from Proust’s questionnaire; probably “what is your greatest regret”, “what is your motto” and “who are your heroes in real life”. They’re nearing the end of their sentence - over a decade - but they haven't heard anything from their captors for a while. Although I occasionally got lost at parts of this story, there was something so deviously claustrophobic about their lives that I was intrigued throughout. Aina and Whitney are exiled together and make a life in truce while blaming each other for the loss of their child.

They have to remain close to their croft due to a biometric clock that dispenses pills that they must take every eight hours to ensure their survival. When her fears become realised, they are faced with being stranded on the island for the rest of their lives. Survival on ‘The Limits ’ is key, based on 8-hourly pills from a timed clock dispensary that inadvertently tether them both to the island, to each other, their quest for freedom, and what they do to achieve it. Metronome by Tom Watson is mysterious, intriguing, and has more than a whiff of the dystopian about it.Watson manipulates the storyline switching from past to present to unsettle the reader, unravelling the backstory as the protagonists begin to disrupt their monotone existence. And while this helps with the suffocating atmosphere at the very bleak end you're left with little understanding or resolution. In other ways, I thought it was representative of the human condition, the tyranny of a government and a set of laws around bodily autonomy and free will. Being with your partner may feel like rainbows and unicorns, but that doesn't mean you have a healthy, functioning relationship. The connection to the sculptures is not obvious at first but once the connection is made, coupled with Whitney’s own artworks, it is explosive.

Daily life is controlled by the distribution of pills necessary for survival on a planet damaged by some unspecified blight. I thought it was interesting that their names weren’t immediately obvious as to who was who, just removed enough from perhaps a more familiar set of names. The two central characters are compelling, if not overly so - I took a long while to connect with them, to be honest, and their frayed relationship. Punished for the crime of having an unauthorised child, Aina and Whitney are banished to an island and tethered to a pill dispenser which keeps them alive. Aina on the other hand has a very different take on things, she’s the one who wants to escape, and by virtue I wanted to be poised at her shoulder throughout.In Whitney and Aina, Watson has created a couple whose secrets threaten both their present and their future and whose emotional limits are test. For me, the most meaningful advice comes from people you either love or respect, and ideally those who have read your work. In his debut novel, Tom Watson seems less interested in the wider political and social reality of his world than in the mundane detail of the characters’ lives and the bleakness of the landscape they inhabit, the emotional standoff that exists between them as a result of the traumatic severing of their previous existence. New and familiar characters abound, voiced by a bright mix of performers, including Kat Dennings, Regé-Jean Page, Emma Corrin, Michael Sheen, Kristen Schaal, Brian Cox, John Lithgow, Jeffrey Wright, and so many more, including fan-favorite narrators Simon Vance and Ray Porter. The Greatest Secret, the long-awaited major work by Rhonda Byrne, lays out the next quantum leap in a journey that will take the listener beyond the material world and into the spiritual realm, where all possibilities exist.

Yan tan tethera is a sheep-counting system used by shepherds traditionally in Northern England and other parts of Britain 🐑. There is trekking, hiking, mapping, swimming, sailing, boating, farming, crofting – down to cutting peat ­– to stimulate our senses.

However, Whitney still stubbornly clings to it and believes that there is someone on the other end of the radio signal who plays chess with him. Beautifully in fact, as we are literally exposed to the elements, so cleverly crafted in this debut novel. From the description is sounded spooky, adrenaline-rushing, and totally captivating – it did not disappoint! In the absolutely packed Act II, the dark fantasy resumes and the Sandman expands into the French Revolution, ancient Rome, 19th-century San Francisco, eighth-century Baghdad, and beyond. When their crime is discovered they become social outcasts, condemned to serve a 12-year sentence of exile on a remote island in the north.

Taut, unsettling and so completely charged with both tension and emotion, I found myself captivated by Metronome. On the day Aina and Whitney are supposed to be collected for parole, nobody turns up; communication with the Warden becomes non-existent. A much-used word, karma is loosely understood as a system of checks and balances in our lives, of good actions and bad deeds, of good thoughts and bad intentions. The terminology suggests some Danish or Scandinavian connection; Viking-esque, given Aina’s surname Ollasson.Using flashbacks Watson takes us back to Aina and Whitney’s life in an unspecified country which is very much like ours, but with small yet noticeable differences. In the story, “yan tan tethera methera pip” was said during some challenging situations, so I assumed it’s a kind of mantra for relaxing … but I was not expecting a Celtic counting system! The last maybe third of the book seemed very rushed, and I think it could have been played out a bit more. I cannot help but think that the premise of this novel is metastatic where even feelings about feelings are involved.