.
The Trowenna Sea by Witi Ihimaera

It is a little known fact that Maori prisoners were part of the convict population of Tasmania in the 1840’s , but this fact provides the inspiration for ‘The Trowenna Sea’.

Hohepa Te Umuroa is with Te Rauparaha at the Wairau killings in the 1840’s and at Boulcott’s Farm in the Hutt Valley when white settlers lose their lives. Convicted of insurrection, he and four companions are transported to the convict town of Hobart to serve their sentences.

Ismay Glossop and her doctor husband Gower McKissock have come to Tasmania via Nelson, New Zealand. On Maria Island near Hobart, their lives intersect with the five Maori with dramatic and unexpected consequences.

The novel is told through the eyes of an eighty year old woman thinking about what she will tell her grand-daughter about her past and Tasmania’s past for the centennial celebrations of the colony. She will not be rushed in her story, and for that we have an epic tale.

This period novel reflects the extent to which Ihimaera researched the events and the era, capturing the different cultures and attitudes of the time. In 2005, Ihimaera was first told of the five Maori that arrived in Tasmania in 1848. For three weeks he did as much research as possible in Tasmania on the event and the reaction of the people when the Maori were kept not at Port Arthur Penitentiary like tother convicts but sent to a facility on Maria Island. When he returned to New Zealand though, Ihimaera was surprised to find that the transportation and story surrounding it had virtually disappeared from New Zealand history.

Anyone who is interested in early New Zealand and Australia or who wants to read a period drama set a bit closer to home will enjoy this novel. It is an engaging and powerful story.

RRP $37.00
Published and distributed by Penguin Group under the Raupo title
 

>> Back to Book Search <<