In a world of unprecedented interconnectedness, islands, in all their forms, have become synonymous with refuge. Whether they are physical places of rare and preserved natural beauty or metaphorical islands of the mind, islands as retreat are asserting themselves. But not every island is a place desired. Some represent isolation, a turning of one's back on nourishing connections, places of exile, of strange happenings, even of entrapment

The winning entry, "Pilgrims" by Tasmanian Greg Burgess, takes the reader on one man's self-contained journey in Japan where, "The pilgrimage was circular ... with eighty-eight temples to visit, spread right around the island. You ended where you began, it didn't matter where that was." It is a quiet and moving story about the unexpected rewards of serendipitous social connection."

Katherine Johnson