Gregory O’Regan – resident

Gregory O’Regan is Hopeless, Maine’s unburialist. This is a rare calling, but the work is vital. Sometimes people are buried when they should not have been. A well practiced and dedicated unburialist can detect these situations and may be able to act in time to stop the presumed dead person from becoming an actually dead person. Of course, if the unburialist is too late then all that is revealed is horror.

When people have been buried secretively with a view to hiding the body, the keen senses of the unburialist are needed to retrieve the victim. Not that this reliably leads to any kind of justice for the dead, but on the whole we find it helps to at least know that they are dead, and where they have been put.

For these reasons, you may well see Gregory at work on the island, digging for those who should not have been buried. It is best not to approach him when he is working, and best not to ask what he is doing. His ability to tell whether people should not have been buried seems to depend on getting them in the ground first, but if you invite him to the funeral and ply him with good beer, then the processes tends to be smoother and less traumatic all round.

(People who want to be islanders are sending in photos. If you’ve got no other way of contacting us, leave a comment and we’ll email you.)