Coldwater

By Mardi McConnochie


Coldwater is set in 1847, it is the tale of three sisters, a fabled version of the three Bronte sisters, Charlotte, Emily and Anne (in this case "Wolf"). The setting is a small island off the coast of Sydney, a prison island, where convicts from Britain were sent.

It is an isolated life they lead, the sisters are late twenties and early thirties, in a time when it is thought most prudent for them to make a good marriage match, their only choices are the officers who come to work at the prison.

Their father is the captain, the person in charge of the prison, he is hard in his thinking, strict, but through the course of the story, slowly goes mad.

The sisters write stories, and have thoughts of being published, a way of living once they leave the island, as they so desperately wish to do.

Two find love in such unexpected people, but diasaster strikes, and only two of the three sisters find happiness in the end.

The tale is told through the voices of the three sisters, through formal prison reports and through the fathers journal. Life in an 1840's australian colonial prison appears depicted well, (as well as any other work i've read set in similiar circumstances), the characters each have an air of mystery around them, but are confined to the period they live in.

Well written, it is an interesting work of fiction.

posted by trickinicki @ 10:31 pm