Whit was published in 1995.
Innocent in the ways of the modern world, Isis Whit is no ordinary teenager.
Instead, she is the ‘Elect of God’ of the Luskentyrians, a small, isolated Scottish religious cult.
When her cousin Morag - Guest of Honour at the upcoming four-yearly Festival of Love - disappears after renouncing her faith, Isis is sent to venture among the Unsaved and bring the apostate back into the fold.
But the road to Babylondon (as Sister Angela puts it) is a treacherous one, particularly when Isis discovers that Morag appears to have embraced the ways of the Unsaved with spectacular abandon...
Iain said, “A common denominator between the science fiction and the mainstream stuff is that it’s taking great swadges at religion. I’m always attacking religion through the usual bogeyman in virtually all the books. With Whit I thought I’d better write something more sympathetic to religion to see what I could do from the point of view of the character. You can become too convinced of your own rectitude and your rightness. I think that is the conflict between reason and faith. I am absolutely 100 per cent on the side of reason. I don’t believe in belief without reason, which is what faith is. Faith is almost belief for the sake of it. I support rationality and I’m all against faith, if you can’t question something you’ve basically fucked up your entire evolutionary programming. You leave yourself open to horrendous actions. That’s something that comes across in all the books to one degree or another. It’s reflected in some of the science fiction books with the clashes between the Culture, which is very rational, and the more faith based, short-sighted bigots who are being selfish and nasty. Like the Tories, really.”
On researching Isis’ journey, Iain said, “I thought what a wheeze it would be to boat the whole length of the Forth. I was brought up on the Forth so it was an obvious idea, [but] we had to take two days off in the middle because my shoulders were so sore. I started without training beforehand and my entire upper body became a mass of pain receptors.”