‘She is the Surprise,’ said Stephen, and he whispered, ‘The joyful Surprise, God and Mary be with her.’

The end of this volume never fails to move me, such a dramatic, emotional, tumultuous ending. Listening to it again (again) I was struck by what a difficult journey they had of it, so many setbacks, and the final tense standoff marooned on a Pacific island. But those final paragraphs, where so much happens in a few terse, beautifully arranged sentences, is perhaps the most dramatic scene of all the books for me.