Author(s): Deborah Challinor

NZ Fiction

When 18-year-old Kitty Carlisle's father dies 1838, her suddenly impoverished mother is left with little more than the possibility of her beautiful daughter making a good marriage. But when Kitty is compromised by an unscrupulous adventurer, her reputation is destroyed. In disgrace, she is banished to the colonies with her dour missionary uncle and his long-suffering wife. In the untamed Bay of Islands, missionaries struggle to establish Victorian England across the harbour from the infamous whaling port of Kororareka, Hell-Hole of the Pacific. There Kitty falls in love with Ryan Farrell, an aloof and irreverent sea captain, but discovers he has secrets of his own. When shocking events force her to flee the Bay of Islands she take srefuge in Sydney, but her independent heart leads her into a web of illicit sexual liaison, betrayal and death.