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Library Friends hold ‘Meet the Author’ event

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Carol Elrod explains that “downtown” Montserrat consists of the post office. ED FRANKS

The Friends of the Pine Island Library held a “Meet the Author” event at the Elks Club last Thursday. Carol Elrod, author of “Goat Water is Not What You Think,” reminisced about her and her husband’s four winters on the small Caribbean island of Montserrat.

Montserrat is a small British island located southeast of Puerto Rico in the Leeward Islands of the Caribbean. The tiny island is approximately 10 miles long by 6 miles wide (less than half the size of Pine Island).

“Our plan was to spend the winter months when I retired from the Indianapolis Star,” Elrod said. “Then we went down for just a month and I just couldn’t get it out of my mind. The house was built with concrete block and it had one bathroom and two bedrooms and a great room. It was sold ‘As-is.’

“We learned a lot when we lived on the island,” she continued. “That there aren’t too many problems just situations. How to make do with less. And to enjoy simple pleasures like watching the full moon rise over the Atlantic Ocean, and the sun coming up every morning.

“We got up early every morning and sat on the porch with our cup of coffee and watched as the clouds turned orange as the edges between the sea and the sky shimmered in the light until the sun popped above the horizon and we had to look away. It is a beautiful, fantastic sight.”

The book records their life on the small island between 1993 and 1996. Their stay was cut short by the eruption of nearby Soufriere Hills volcano.

Elrod has been a “writer” since she was a teenager and wrote her first book when she was 20 years old.

“I wrote my first failed novel when I was 20 years old,” Elrod said. “And after our experiences on Montserrat, I decided it was about time that I try to get something published.

“Life in Montserrat was often quirky, with cockroaches, cows and goats everywhere,” Elrod said. “The minute we stepped in the door and turned on the light, cockroaches the size of mice were everywhere. We spent that first night trying to kill them but it took some time to make the house livable.

“We were there for four winters and we took our dog and cat and totally moved in,” Elrod said. “Then the rumblings of the volcano began. The volcano was two miles up the mountainside from our back door and then after a while it began extruding lava. As things continued to get worse we were evacuated and then the eruption came. Our house and that whole section of the island was buried under ash and lava.”

The back cover of the book describes the Elrod’s experience: “Carol Elrod shows us the poignancy of having given oneself to a place so completely and then having it crushed literally by a volcano that wasn’t supposed to erupt and which covered their home and their dreams.”