The convent by Maureen McCarthy
Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 2012. ISBN 9781742375045.
(Age: 16+) Highly recommended. This is a delightfully engaging novel
about four women tied together by family and setting: the Abbotsford
Convent, Melbourne. The novel opens in contemporary times with
Peach, a 19 year old university student seeking a summer job at one
of the convent's cafes. She flags at the outset that this story will
be about the past, about the impact of the lives of three other
women on her own... but she doesn't yet know the missing link -
the convent itself.
And so the reader moves back and forth between Peach and the stories
of Sadie (whose child was taken from her in 1915), her daughter
Ellen (brought up in the convent in the 1920s) and Cecilia (a young
nun at the same convent in the sixties). It is not only the setting
that ties these women together, it is also religion and babies. And
their stories have a modern echo in Peach's own life, for her dear,
damaged friend Det, is pregnant - will she keep the baby or give it
up for adoption? And how will her plans impact on Peach, herself an
adopted child? As Det is an artist with a studio in the convent, the
ties of place and birth are even stronger.
This novel is written with warmth and intelligence. The characters
are very real, their personal struggles are sympathetically evoked
and so their lives are immediately engaging. With only one first
person narrator (Peach) the reader is able to learn more about her
back story than Peach herself, so our interest in the mystery of
this family saga is constantly being tweaked. On one level, this
story is about a young girl coming to terms with her history, her
identity and her sense of family; it is about the ties of friendship
and romance. But layered over this is the broader and richer story
of changing times, of opportunities for women, of the impact of
motherhood and religious conviction and love. It is a story with
warmth and heart and style; a winning combination from well-known
author, Maureen McCarthy.
Deborah Marshall