Blog Tour: The Transcendant Tide – Doug Johnstone

It’s been eighteen months since the Enceladons escaped the clutches of an American military determined to exterminate the peaceful alien creatures.

Lennox and Vonnie have been lying low in the Scottish Highlands, Ava has been caring for her young daughter Chloe, and Heather is adjusting to her new life with Sandy and the other Enceladons in the Arctic Ocean, off the coast of Greenland. But fate is about to bring them together again for one last battle.

When Lennox and Vonnie are visited by Karl Jensen, a Norwegian billionaire intent on making contact with the Encedalons again, they are wary of subjecting the aliens to further dangers. But when word arrives that Ava’s daughter has suffered an attack and might die without urgent help, they reluctantly make the trip to Greenland, where they enlist the vital help of local woman Niviaq. It’s not long before they’re drawn into a complex web of lies, deceit and death.

What is Karl’s company really up to? Why are sea creatures attacking boats? Why is Sandy acting so strangely, and why are polar bears getting involved?

Profound, ambitious and moving, The Transcendent Tide is the epic conclusion to the Encedalons Trilogy, and a final showdown between the best and worst of humanity, the animal kingdom and the Encedalons. The future of life on earth will be changed forever, but not everyone will survive to see it…

Doug Johnstone is the author of 18 previous novels, most recently Living Is a Problem (2024) and The Collapsing Wave (2024). The Big Chill (2020) was longlisted for Theakston Crime Novel of the Year, and Black Hearts was shortlisted for the same award. Three of his books, A Dark Matter (2020), Breakers (2019) and The Jump (2015), have been shortlisted for the McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Novel of the Year.

He’s taught creative writing and been writer in residence at various institutions over the last decade, and has been an arts journalist for over twenty years. Doug is a songwriter and musician with six albums and three EPs released, and he plays drums for the Fun Lovin’ Crime Writers. He’s also co-founder of the Scotland Writers Football Club, and has a PhD in nuclear physics. He lives in Edinburgh.

My thoughts: We reach the end of the story of the Enceledons and their time on Earth, Sandy, Xander and the others have reached a place of safety in Greenland, or so it seems. Lennox and Vonnie are students studying sealife in Scotland, Ava is trying to adjust to life with Chloe, who still doesn’t speak. Heather and the other humans who chose to go with Sandy are slowly changing into hybrid human/Enceledons, deep in the Arctic Ocean.

But danger is coming their way. A billionaire obsessed with the aliens is trying to find them, and reaches out to Lennox and Vonnie. They’re reluctant, but Chloe becomes life-threateningly ill and only Sandy and co can help.

Events take a shocking and horrifying turn and once again the Enceledons and their friends are at risk. Changes have also been taking place in the ocean, the residents of the depths are fighting back (like the whales we’ve probably all seen online tipping fishing boats) and the local Inuit community get involved too.

I was fascinated by the descriptions of the lives of the native Greenlanders, how they have managed to preserve and protect their traditions despite the Danish attempts to colonise them.

I did cry, there are some very sad and upsetting moments and I freely admit to being a typically soppy animal lover, and feeling guilty for occasionally eating meat and fish. I also really love Sandy and his friends, these huge, gentle creatures who come to Earth for sanctuary, and find only violence abd death. I want to press copies of this trilogy into the hands of every corrupt politician and business owner and beg them to remember we aren’t the only lifeforms on this planet.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.