Always North - Vicki Jarrett

We all have to work to live, even if it is an illegal survey for oil in the rapidly melting arctic.

 Software engineer Isobel needs to eat like everyone, and that's how she fell into the job that leads her to the most northerly place on our planet. As part of a weathered crew of sailors, scientists and corporate officers she sails into the ice where their advanced software Proteus will map everything there is to know.

A great icebreaker leads their way into the brutal environment, and the days grow longer, time ever more detached, as they pass through the endless white expanse of the ice. But they are not alone. They have attracted the attention of seals, gulls and a hungry, dedicated polar bear. The journey to plunder one of the few remaining resources the planet has to offer must endure the ravages of the ice, the bear and time itself.

This is what we find when we travel - Always North - a profound meditation on our consumption of the world, and the perception of time. For fans of Adam Robert's The Thing Itself, only at the farthest reaches of the world can we see the truths closest to our minds.