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Loading... The making of martin sparrowby Peter Cochrane
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. A strong novel, convincing on the subtleties of relationships in early NSW. It shows the harshness of colonial life, and its hideous consequences for the prior inhabitants. Most of the events told are backed by historical truth, the violence between Aborgines and colonists, even the wife sale. Some of the characters are based on historical figues, such as Andrew Thompson, who left much of his property to the governor. The writing is beautiful, and the plot anything but. The Dramatis Personae becomes a list of the dead. The death toll is like that of several episodes of Midsomer Murders. In that show, arrogance often leads to death. In this novel, it tends to be violent selfishness. ( ) no reviews | add a review
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Martin Sparrow is already struggling when the Hawkesbury's great flood of March 1806 lays waste to him and his farm. Luckless, lovelorn and deep in debt, the ex-convict is confronted with a choice. He can buckle down and set about his agricultural recovery, or he can heed the whispers of an earthly paradise on the far side of the mountains - a place where men are truly free - and strike out for a new life. But what chance of renewal is there for a man like Sparrow in either the brutal colony or the forbidding wilderness? The decision he makes triggers a harrowing chain of events and draws in a cast of extraordinary characters, including Alister Mackie, the chief constable on the river; his deputy, Thaddeus Cuff; the vicious hunter, Griffin Pinney; the Romany girl, Bea Faa; and the young Aboriginal men, Caleb and Moowut'tin, caught between war and peace. Set against the awe-inspiring immensity of the hinterland west of the Hawkesbury River, this epic of chance and endurance is an immersion into another time, a masterpiece of language and atmosphere. Rich, raw, strangely beautiful and utterly convincing, The Making of Martin Sparrow reveals Peter Cochrane - already one of our leading historians - as one of our most compelling novelists. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)829.3Literature English & Old English literatures Old English literature, ca. 450-1100 BeowulfRatingAverage:
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