The Uttermost Place Welcome to the website for the novel, The Uttermost Place, and its author, Sandy Constable. The novel is a thriller, set in Patagonia, specifically the far south of Chile. This is a land of extremes – magnificent mountains, vast glaciers, unrelenting wind, and little-known forests. It is the forests that are at the center of the novel’s story. A number of forestry and energy projects introduced me to Chile in the 1980’s and 1990’s. Chile had always piqued my interest – far away, exotic, and in my mind, a frontier. Now I had the opportunity to visit. Chileans are a wonderful people – proud and hard working, ethnically diverse, and possessing a sly sense of humor. It was this combination of compelling landscape and warm, interesting people that launched me to write a novel. There are many friends and colleagues, both Chilean and Canadian, to thank for inspiration and support. The novel is a thriller – the story line revolves around a forest project in the island of Tierra del Fuego. The novel’s protagonist, Stan Shepherd, comes to Patagonian Chile to buy a mine. He is a mining engineer, and always a risk-taker. His most recent mine deal was a disaster, costing him his girlfriend, his savings, and tainting his professional reputation. Now he’s at the end of the earth, lured by another deal. He has also agreed to look at a forest on Tierra del Fuego for a Chilean friend. The forest is a surprise – vast and valuable – and catches his imagination. The two friends plunge in, purchasing forestland. But there is trouble – lots of it – unscrupulous rivals, a missing Swedish forestry expert, and a German environmentalist – a woman with attitude.