First Published: 2013
It is 1863, 16 years after the events happening in the first book.
Ida and Karl Jensen are travelling on the North Island with their fifteen-year-old daughter, Mara. Karl is working for the government to mediate between the Maori and some farmers. Mara is not happy as she wants to return home after months away. She misses Eru, who she loves. Eru is the son of Jane and Te Haitara, and it seems that Jane doesn't want Eru to liaise with Mara.
Karl manages to sort out the problems between the farmers and the Maori. They decide to stay when they hear that a Maori preacher is to talk that day and there is a party afterwards. When the preacher gets there and starts talking, they get alarmed as the man talks about starting a war against the while man.
In Canterbury Cat is taking care of Carol and Linda. Carol is now engaged to Oliver Butler, whose mother Lady Deborah is very strict in his views about what is proper and what is improper. Carol and Linda know that they share their father but Ida and Cat are their mothers, but they call Ida and Cat Maida and Macat as they consider both of them their mothers. Everybody else thinks that Linda and Carol are twins, and they think that it is strange how these girls have grown up with two mothers and two fathers.
In Australia we get to see the Langes again. Franz, Ida's youngest brother, has been ordained priest, and he is to be sent to New Zealand as a missionary. His father, Jacob, has remarried, and his stepmother is very kind. Yet, Jacob is as inflexible as always, so he feels that Jacob deciding to become a priest is a betrayal.
No comments:
Post a Comment