For anyone interested in visiting Bardsey Island, there is no better place to start than here: www.bardsey.org/english/bardsey/welcome.asp. This site gives details of the trust that administers the island as well as information about its arts, archaeology and natural history. It also provides prospective visitors with everything they need in terms of how to book day trips or longer visits, with pictures of all the available accommodation. I can assure anyone thinking of visiting that the journey is exhilarating, the hotels on the mainland are fantastic and that the cottages available for rent are not as spooky as the one Tom Thorne is forced to spend the night in.

www.bardsey.org/english/staying/staying_bardsey.htm

Bardsey is a National Nature Reserve and a Site of Special Scientific Interest. Further details can be found here:

www.bardsey.org/english/the_island/natural_history.htm

Those specifically interested in the island’s birds can get detailed day-by-day reports from the Bird and Field Observatory, with wonderful pictures and up-to-date information about more than 175 species, here: https://bbfo.blogspot.co.uk.

The last King of Bardsey, Love Pritchard, died in 1926, and was buried close to the beach in Aberdaron cemetery. Find out all about him, the kings who ruled before him, and what became of the legendary crown of Bardsey here: www.bardsey.org/english/the_island/king.htm

Bardsey Lighthouse was built in 1821, stands a little over thirty metres high and, unlike almost all other Trinity lighthouses, is square. The top of it is also the only place on the island I was able to get so much as a glimmer of a phone signal, and I dislike heights as much as Tom Thorne.

www.trinityhouse.co.uk/lighthouses/lighthouse_list/bardsey.html

Bardsey’s religious significance, its history as a place of pilgrimage and the story of those twenty thousand saints are detailed here: www.bardsey.org/english/the_island/pilgrims.htm

A remote and all-but-deserted island, cut off from the mainland with no mobile phone signal is, of course, a wonderful place to set a crime novel. In reality, however, I cannot remember spending time anywhere as peaceful as Ynys Enlli. Though not a religious person myself, I can fully understand its status as a place of pilgrimage and can see why it is so beloved of artists, writers and natural historians. If even one reader who has enjoyed The Bones Beneath is tempted to visit Bardsey Island – to hear the Manx shearwater at night, to watch the sun set behind those spectacular abbey ruins, to escape the stress of modern city living for a few days or simply to search for the place where Stuart Nicklin buried those bodies – then I shall be a very happy author.

Mark Billingham, London, 2013