Missing Pieces

Recently I read The Chessmen by Peter May, the third book in the Lewis Trilogy crime series. Part of the story revolved around a collection of chess pieces found on Lewis in 1831. Missing Pieces by Jennifer Mackenzie Dunbar is a historical fiction novel about four sets of chess pieces carved in the twelfth century. Many of the pieces washed up on the shores of Lewis after the ship carrying the pieces was wrecked. 

In this novel we learn the story from those who had contact with the chess pieces - Magrit who carved the pieces in Iceland in 1190; Morven and Seamus who discovered the shipwrecked chess pieces in 1190 and arranged to have them hidden; Mhairi and Calum who discovered the chessmen again in 1831.

The novel is also about Marianne who works at the British Museum and arrives in Lewis to prepare a display of some of the pieces in the small museum at Lewis. At Lewis she is assisted by Agnes and Euan as well as her mother, Shona, as they decide to look for the pieces that were never found.

Marianne also has to contend with workplace bullying from her supervisor in London, has to reestablish her relationship with her mother and also decide whether she wants to meet her son who she gave up for adoption when she was sixteen. While working on Lewis, Marianne discovers new friends as she decides what is really important in her life.