Talking Location with Author Peter Barber: PEFKI, NORTH EVIA, GREECE

19th January 2026

Peter Barber

#TalkingLocationWith … Peter Barber, author of the ‘Zorba’s Taverna’ series and ‘The Parthenon’ series.

Statue of Zeus

I didn’t come to Pefki looking for a setting for my books. I came with my Greek wife, looking for a quieter life. Which, in Greece, is always the first mistake. Pefki sits on the northern edge of the island of Evia, facing the Aegean Sea with a kind of calm self-assurance. It isn’t a polished resort and doesn’t try to be. Fishing boats still come in at dawn. Old men still argue about football and politics with equal passion. Coffee is taken seriously, slowly, and always in public. It was this ordinariness,this lived-in, unperformed Greece that drew me in. At the heart of Pefki stands the statue of Zeus. It doesn’t celebrate victory or conquest or even attempt to look particularly divine. It simply stands there, back to the sea, arms open in welcome, as if waiting for someone, or something, or perhaps just the next morning. This is where news arrives before it’s confirmed, where rumours are patiently polished into facts, and where everyone knows who has fallen out with whom, and, more importantly, who started it. The tavernas don’t chase trends. If the boats came in, there’s fish. If they didn’t, there isn’t. Wine arrives without ceremony. Menus are more suggestion than promise. When you ask what’s good, the answer is usually, “Whatever we have.”

A morning coffee

This is the Greece I write about. Not the staged version, but the everyday one, generous, funny, and occasionally exhausting. Pefki’s beach runs quietly alongside the village, changing mood throughout the day. Early mornings belong to fishermen and walkers. Afternoons bring families and the slow rhythm of summer. Evenings are for sitting,not swimming, not photographing, just sitting and looking.The sea here isn’t decoration. Its presence. People in Pefki don’t visit the sea. They consult it. They read it like a mood ring, a memory, a warning system. When its calm, life feels lighter. When it isn’t, everyone notices.Step inland and the village softens. Olive groves rise into pine-covered hills, the air cools, and sound thins to birdsong and wind. Paths climb slowly into a quieter Greece, scented with resin, earth, and the passing of centuries.Here stands the old olive tree, 2,500 years rooted to the same soil,watching over the village with the patience of something that has seen empires arrive, argue, and leave again.

The view on a walk

These walks are where the village breathes. They’re also where perspective arrives, often uninvited. From above, the village shrinks. Arguments feel smaller. Problems become patterns rather than emergencies. North Evia is greener than most people expect. Less dramatic than postcard Greece, perhaps, but deeper. It doesn’t shout. It waits. In recent years, Pefki has been tested. Wildfires tore through North Evia with a violence that’s hard to explain unless you’ve smelled burning pine and watched familiar hills disappear. Then came the floods, water rushing down paths that had never known it, reminding everyone that nature keeps its own records.These events changed the village, not just physically, but emotionally. And yet, people stayed.They cleaned. They rebuilt. They argued about what should have been done differently. They helped each other while insisting, loudly, that no one was doing it properly. In other words, they carried on.That stubborn resilience is part of why Pefki became more than a backdrop for my books. It became a character.

Zorba’s Embrace – published 30 January

Together, the people form akind of untidy orchestra. They argue, interrupt, contradict one another, and occasionally storm off, only to return later with chairs, ladders, opinions, and, most importantly, food. Always food. Problems in Pefki are never faced on an empty stomach. They are not sentimental people, but they are deeply loyal. Once Pefki decides you belong, it doesn’t let go easily. Living among there wonderful people teaches you something simple and profound: community isn’t harmony. It’s persistence. It’s turning up, again and again, even when you’re tired, even when you’re irritated, even when you’re absolutely certain someone else caused the problem. Especially then.Pefki didn’t just become the setting for my stories.It became the reason. Small villages magnify life. Nothing stays hidden. Kindness is noticed. So are mistakes. You learn quickly that belonging isn’t about being perfect, it’s about being present. I thought I was choosing a village. It turns out, the village was choosing me.

Peter Barber

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