Is Camino Island Based On A Real Florida Island?

Question

No spoilers please, but I keep picturing a real Florida location while reading. Trying to map the fictional Camino Island's setting to actual coastal towns and resorts in the region.

Ilaisaane Soafa · Answer

This is a fictional island and not a location in Florida. I thought you might like a real, tense island setting for a story. ‘The Billionaire’s Island Bargain’ is a story about a man who buys an island in a high-stakes property deal. The story takes place on a remote, tropical island where the main character and several other characters experience isolation and struggle with their conflicting ambitions.

Isla · Answer

This book made me want to be drinking coffee on a sunny dock. ‘Camino Island’ is not a real place in Florida. The island that John Grisham created for this story is a made-up little stage for all the wacky shopkeepers and salty locals that he can bring in to help tell the story of stolen rare books.

And yet, at the same time, Grisham is simply borrowing the mood of the Florida Keys – its laid-back marinas, rumors of past hurricanes, the tight little communities where everyone knows everyone, and the small seafood shops. There are no real street names on Camino Island but if you’ve ever walked down the streets of Key West or Islamorada you’ll recognize the feel of the place. The island is clearly a fiction but it’s the best of both worlds – allowing Grisham to tell the story he wants to tell while allowing readers to dream of real islands. It’s inspired me to book a weekend’s stay in a seaside island town.

Yvonne · Answer

I enjoy make-believe settings and Camino Island, the new novel by John Grisham, is a fictional place that is fully developed and real to me, even though it’s not a real Florida island. Most of the detail in developing the settings of the novel are based on his experiences of the Florida Keys, particularly the marinas, hot humid days and nights and the gossip and rumors that go on in small towns. He could have set the novel on any of the many Florida islands but he decided to invent his own place to create a setting for his mystery that he could control as he went along to suit the needs of the plot. Most authors create fictional settings for their stories for these reasons.

By coincidence, there is a real place called Camano Island in the state of Washington. While this can sometimes be confusing for readers, Camino Island is a totally fictional place created by Grisham to enhance the mystery of the story and to make the rare-book caper even more fun to imagine. I don’t have a problem with the fact that Camino Island is not real – it is a playground of sorts that I can return to whenever I wish.

Aiden · Answer

The depiction of sun, salt and shady book dealers in Camino Island is very good, but Grisham isn’t depicting an actual Florida island. When I read a novel that includes a geographic setting, I am always intrigued to see how the author uses truth and fiction in terms of the setting and Grisham’s use of Key elements in Camino Island is very good. He uses elements of several marinas, hurricane preparation, laid-back Key locals and soil rich for condo-store type bookstores in a fictional island that he can invent and include any quirky landmarks he desires.

For reference, the plot of Camino Island could easily have taken place in Key West, in Islamorada, in one of the other Upper Keys towns. The novel has a strong sense of place, which would translate well to film shot on location in the above-mentioned locations, perhaps supplemented by standing sets of a few key locations to get at the “interiors” of the characters’ world. For purposes of imagination, I’d built up a sort of “island of the imagination” which felt real enough that I’d be happy to go there for a week or two. But it’s not “real” in the sense that it doesn’t actually exist on a map.

Grayson · Answer

Back to another great novel by John Grisham, ‘Camino Island’. It’s a novel that reminds me of a great playlist. It’s a book that’s so curious, so nostalgic, and so full of suspicion. The setting for ‘Camino Island’ is a fictional island created by Mr. Grisham. It’s not a real place that you can find on any map. Instead it’s a composite of all of the smells, the sights, the experiences of all of the coastal towns in Florida. In this novel you can experience a small town with a literary scene. You can experience a salt-bleached wooden porch. You can experience a shrimp boat chugging along. You can experience the quiet of a sleepy marina. You can experience an old book shop filled with the musty smell of old books and the taste of coffee.

The setting of Florida in the story really reminds me of certain places that I have visited on weekend getaways to the small Gulf Islands of Sanibel, to Key West, to Amelia Island, to Cedar Key, etc. There are certain traits that make up these ‘beach towns’ where the main street is lined with touristy shops, there are lots of artists, etc. Grisham must have been using Florida as a setting because it is so rich in the traits listed above and because it is easy to make up a setting for a story and have it be as real as a place that the reader knows. This is what many authors do with settings for stories. They can use traits of several real places to make up one sharper, more convenient setting for the story. The author can then include as much or as little verisimilitude as desired regarding the geography, politics, history, etc. of the made-up place.

What Florida really means in Camino Island is a sort of halfway ground between tourist trap and real community, a loose space where people of all sorts of eccentricity roam freely. And in this sort of sun-rough, weathered archetypal Florida island (you can park a bike anywhere and buy used books by the yard in just about any of the many beachside towns up and down the state), there’s just something wonderful about Grisham’s creation of this tropical yet somehow also undistinct space to start a mystery and explore a delightful beach read in all its whimsy.

Julia · Answer

When I read Camino Island I knew right off the bat that it was a fictional island created by John Grisham to tell a very specific and unique story. Although he includes many familiar details of Key West style architecture and more, there is no real island in Florida by the name of Camino Island. All of the islands in Florida, even the small ones, have marinas, and everyone knows each other’s business. There are old piers made of wood that creak and groan in the wind, and sudden, intense storms that can roll in at any time.

For those unfamiliar with the book, the island described is nowhere near a specific Florida island. Rather, Grisham combined all of the wonderful aspects of Key life and placed them on a fictional island, included in the story solely to enhance the plot. The reader can easily tell that a real Florida Keys island was used as inspiration for the book. I even knew of a Camano Island (outside of Washington State) prior to reading the book. This fictional island serves the purpose perfectly – capturing the salt and sun of Florida’s wonderful coastal regions while never feeling as though I was reading a travel brochure. The setting and inspiration created such wonderful images in my head of tropical-sun-drenched-After-Sunset-scene postcard qualities as I read.

Zoe · Answer

Camino Island is not a real island that you can drive to in Florida. It’s a fictional place created by author John Grisham. However, Grisham got the “flavor” of many real Florida islands such as the small bookstores found in many coastal towns and cities, the salt air, the storefronts found in touristy areas, and the slow afternoons when seemingly minor crimes can take on a larger meaning.

It does bring to mind the Keys as well as other island destinations like Sanibel and even smaller places like Cedar Key or even Amelia Island. I think the island in this story functions more as a character than a setting of a specific place, and it is an archetype for the kind of island that one finds in Florida. I really liked this, because it was easy for me to imagine walking the streets of this island, even though it is largely a composite of different places. And it is strange enough to want to be the setting for a high-stakes heist as well as for a story about rare books.

Shwetha Manohar · Answer

This book is Disney World for book lovers. "Camino Island" is a clean, safe, highly themed environment that is all about books. It's not real life, it's a construct, but it's wonderful. Just as you don't go to Disney World to experience real life in Florida, you wouldn't read "Camino Island" to read a non-fiction book about Florida. Instead, you'd read it to experience a curated literary-coastal environment. The book is a construct and that's what makes it so great.

L. J. Bleyk · Answer

I mostly lurk in book threads. I'm not very good at analyzing settings. This place seems like it would be a nice change of pace for me, though!

Belle Cassy · Answer

I got half way through this book before I put it down to read another series, I really need to get back into this as it is really good and the setting of the island looked lovely.

cybl.phm · Answer

I found the literary scene of the island depicted in the novel to be sort of fascinating and also somewhat satirical. Writers, collectors and hangers-on seemed to orbit around the central figure of Bruce Cable and his bookstore. As the island is probably real in only the sense that many authors have their own private worlds, it serves as a microcosm of a certain segment of the publishing world. The isolation of the island magnifies the tittle tattle, rivalries and the sometimes seemingly obsessional values placed on reputation and also on money. Grisham is not simply describing a place, he is using the setting as a sort of laboratory to nurture a particular kind of drama.

Is Camino Island Based On A Real Florida Island?

11 Answers

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