In 1867, the American steamer Quaker City arrived at Horta in the Azores bound on a five-month journey to Europe and the Holy Land. Its most prominent passenger, Samuel Clemens, wrote that the Azores were so little known that, on the whole ship, "there was not a solitary individual who knew anything whatever about them." But this obscurity was not limited to American travelers.

In 1926, the Portuguese writer Raul Brandão visited the Azores, including the island of Pico, and wrote a classic of Portuguese travel literature. Its title As Ilhas Desconhecidas - The Unknown Islands - speaks for itself. Indeed, the island of Pico has been covered in a virtual fog of almost perfect obscurity. So much so that, in his 2012 book, Roger Lovegrove featured the island of Pico as one of the world’s twenty most remote and isolated places.

This English-language work, Shades of Black and Gray - An inquiry into the Island of Pico and its history, attempts to dispel some of this fog by illuminating Pico’s history in question-and-answer format. The work addresses the island’s discovery and settlement and other essential elements such as religion, whaling, winemaking, and emigration that helped shape the island from the 15th century to the current date.