"A highly readable, enjoyable account of oneman's year serving as a doctor at Halley Research Station, the BritishAntarctic Survey's base on the Brunt Ice Shelf.A literate, stylish memoir of personal adventure rich in history, geography and science."-- Kirkus Review "A book full of wonder"-- Sunday Times "Avaluable addition to polar literature, vividly describing the brutal, butbeautiful, realities of undergoing an Antarctic winter"-- Sir Ranulph Fiennes "Moving,mesmerizing, and wonderful"-- The Economist " EmpireAntarctica is the embodiment of everything I admire in travel writing- a great journey, intense isolation, wide reading, vivid writing, scientificresearch, and something in the nature of an old-fashioned ordeal. That GavinFrancis is a medical doctor, with an important role to play in the darkness andcold at the ends of the earth, is a bonus. I loved this book"-- Paul Theroux "Thisis the sort of book that gives obsession a very good name. Here, in a cold,silent place you realise that obsession is another name for love. And loveleads to extraordinary and beautiful writing . this is a wonderfulbook"-- Sara Maitland "A beautiful, profound and highly readable account of a remarkable personal adventure.

Francis's pacing is deft, his prose vivid, his research worn lightly. This is probably as close as most of us will ever get to experiencing a modern polar winter. Empire Antarctica is surely destined to become a standard, not so much of travel as of staying very still"-- Daily Telegraph "An intense and lyrical portrait of the slowly changing polar seasons . shines with a clarity and lyricism descended from Thoreau"-- Times Literary Supplement "A beautiful hymn to limitless solitude . His bracing year spent among emperor penguins presents an ordeal that is also a joy. And it's beautifully written on every page"-- Tom Adair "Francis' best writing (and it is excellent) . is Robert Macfarlane on ice. This writing achieves the 'quilted quality' of silence, and through it we are brought to a new landscape of words"-- Literary Review "A finely written account of an extreme experience of the Antarctic, worthy to stand beside some of the great travel narratives in the English language"-- RSL Ondaatje Prize Judges.