The Caithness author Neil M. Gunn dedicated his 1937 novel Highland River to his brother John, a mathematics and physics graduate. Their father was a fisherman in Dunbeath, and the book weaves together John’s pursuit of ideas in physics with a fisherman’s scanning of the sea to the far horizon – and also to the journey from the known world of the harbour up the river, in search of its distant source. Prof. Donna Heddle of UHI’s Institute for Northern Studies looks at the book and its setting. Supported by the Royal Society of Edinburgh.