The publication of “Fear Not to Follow” by Naamah (Samantha) McHarg proves the adage that we each have a book within us. Ms McHarg's is a popular history of her mother's life and her own, which between them span the 20th century.

The later chapters of the book will be of primary interest to Bermudian readers because, for almost three decades, Ms McHarg was the librarian at Appleby, Spurling & Kempe, one of Bermuda's leading law firms.

The interested local reader will find plenty of the general to be of interest, but perhaps too little of the specific. All those years at a law firm, and the leading players in Ms McHarg's books are forever discreetly joining “an insurance company”, for example.

Were the author to dish the dirt about such commercial enterprises, her discretion might be necessary, but her revelations are more personal and I, for one, would have appreciated greater and more precise details on names and places. But this cavil is no place to start in describing Ms McHarg's achievement in setting down this lengthy and readable story (for that is what she makes of it) of her mother's life.

As a note on the dust jacket informs us, this is the author's sole entry in the publication stakes, and it is one of which she should be inordinately proud. Writing books, especially for the casual combatant, is no cakewalk. The most illuminating tale about the amount of work required is a short and ancient one. Two men meet.

First man: I'm writing a book.

Second man: Neither am I.

Published by Chandler House Press, a specialty publisher in Worcester, Massachusetts, (where the author spent her early years), “Fear Not to Follow” reminded me of work in another field.

The scions of comfortable families tend to have their photographic portraits taken at regular intervals, allowing historians to tap into a wealth of visual information with which to illuminate the written record.

Ms McHarg's book includes no photographs, and so the book becomes our only source of information. It must, therefore, double, in a way, to make up for the lack of visual imagery.

To a great extent, it succeeds. The author's style, as one might expect of a librarian, is spare and unemotional. Ms McHarg's mother neither drank nor danced, so we are saved endless indiscretions (much as we might have enjoyed them), although one doubts the author would have wasted many words on the errant side of her family's activities even if they had one.

Bermuda is a late arrival in the book, since Ms McHarg did not come here to work until she was in her 40s, although she visited several times before moving here permanently.

When the Island does show up, it is in a former guise, the one to which many nostalgists wish it would return: small cars, nice people, lazy ways and friendly Bermudans.

The name by which the sons and daughters of the Bermuda soil are known is controversial. To this day, most dictionaries call them Bermudans. So does Ms McHarg, at least in print. So does a certain element of the professional cadre of British professionals who work here.

All of them are wrong. The people of Bermuda are Bermudians, by their own account, regardless of what the dictionaries may say. No one calls the residents of the large country to the northwest Canadans, do they?

Again, this is small meat in the face of Ms McHarg's superhuman effort, but I must make one more comment. The author faithfully records conversations dating back to before her birth, which is a dangerous device.

We cannot know with certainty what people said, or were thinking, without a detailed record. Hardly anyone speaks in complete and coherent sentences. Few record their conversations verbatim - thank Goodness - and the reader always wonders how real such invented conversations might be. Ms McHarg had no choice in this matter, and has limited her use of such conversations, which is to her credit.

“Fear Not to Follow” is a solid read, and an enjoyable one. No one who writes and publishes a book of this scope or quality is to be discouraged in any way and, minor quibbles apart, I would be the first to congratulate her on a job well done.

Fear Not to Follow by Naamah McHarg (Chandler House Press, Worcester, MA, boards, 552 pp.)