Review: The Butterfly Women

Title: The Butterfly Women

Author: Madeleine Cleary

Publisher: 29th April 2025 by Simon & Schuster (Australia) | Affirm Press

Pages: 400 pages

Genre:  General Fiction (Adult) | Historical Fiction | Mystery & Thrillers

Synopsis:

It's 1863, and Melbourne is transitioning from a fledgling colony to a thriving, gold-fuelled metropolis. But behind its shiny new façade, the real Melbourne can be found in the notorious red-light district of Little Lon, full of brothels where rich and poor alike can revel all night. The most glamorous among them is Papillon, home to the most alluring women in the city.

For poor Irishwoman Johanna Callaghan, a job at Papillon could be her ticket to success, but in a time when women's lives are cheap, it also brings great danger. Meanwhile, for respectable women like journalist Harriett Gardiner, Papillon is strictly off-limits, but when a murderer begins stalking the streets of Little Lon, she becomes determined to visit it and find the truth.

As both women are drawn into the hunt for the killer, a long-hidden side of old Melbourne is revealed. Lush, dark and meticulously researched, The Butterfly Women weaves romance and mystery into an unforgettable tale of Australian history, and the women so often erased from it.

My Thoughts

Madeleine's debut novel, The Butterfly Women is a sure-fire winner - I loved it. Melbourne in 1863 is growing exponentially thanks to the discovery of gold, however, all that glitters is not gold. This shiny new façade conceals the real Melbourne where the notorious red-light district of Little Lon is found.  Brothels are attended by rich and poor alike and the most glamorous among them is Papillon, home to the most alluring women in the city. A murderer is stalking the streets of Little Lon, including the Butterfly women, and it must be stopped. 

‘We may resemble pretty little butterflies, Captain, but we have been in more fights and know these streets better than your men.’

Reading about the Melbourne of this era was absolutely fascinating. Combine that with memorable women and a page turning murder mystery and I couldn’t put it down. The story is told through the voices of four women: Johanna an Irish ‘dressed’ woman, Catherine the brothel owner, Mary who police patrols the streets in her husband's uniform and Harriet a respected journalist. All these women’s lives interconnect as together they work towards trying to get by in a man’s world. It was so engrossing to read about my city from a time long past. A stunning debut filled with twists and turns told through a feminist lens. 

‘For while John and many of the town’s men failed to find their fortunes on the goldfields, Catherine and the women they’d left behind found theirs in the boarding houses and brothels of this dusty town.’

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.

 

Review: The Sea Captain's Wife

Title: The Sea Captain's Wife

Author: Jackie French

Publisher: 6th March 2024 by Harlequin Australian, HQ & Mira

Pages: 480 pages

Genre: Historical Fiction

Rating: 4.5 cups

Synopsis:

From bestselling author Jackie French comes a compelling story of murder, mystery, and mutiny on the high seas - and a love so intense it can overcome two different cultures.

You never know what the sea will give you ... or what it will take back.

When Mair McCrae follows her island tradition and hunts for a husband cast up on the beach, she has no notion that the naked, half-drowned man she rescues is not just Captain Michael Dawson, heir to a major shipping firm, but that he's obsessed by a 'ghost ship' carrying golden cargo.

On Big Henry Island women make the decisions and knit the patterns that mark a man as their own. But Big Henry is also a volcano, and threatening to erupt. Yet when Mair agrees to accompany Michael home, she finds that the Australian comfort he promised has a danger just as a social system that tries to keep women confined to small roles at the edges of men's lives.

And as Michael hunts for the 'Ghost' in his revolutionary new steamship, a string of mysterious deaths upends Mair's new life in Sydney.

Who is the murderer, and why is Mair the only one who realises what is happening?

My Thoughts

With a Jackie French book readers are always guaranteed an engaging story. This story is so unique detailing a community of women living on a remote island that is also home to a volcano. This self sufficient group of women work well together being very resourceful. Few men live on the island - excepting those who perhaps have washed ashore from a shipwreck. The main character, Mair, discovers one such man and this is their story. Of course they fall in love, however, where the story really takes off is when Mair agrees to accompany him back to Sydney. 

‘Mair was the perfect wife for a sea captain, he told himself, carefully forgetting in his peace and pleasure that she knew little beyond this island, that she would find his world as strange as he found this’

Here readers will discover how Mair struggles to adjust to Sydney society with the running of the family shipping company (both of which the reader must give some leeway at her quick adaptation given her sheltered existence). Add to the story a ghost ship filled with gold, a volcano that erupts, murder and mystery and this book quickly escalates to become a great tale. Jackie draws excellent contrasts in the two ways of living Mair has been exposed to and the role of women. The ghost ship and mysterious deaths just provide an added bonus being the proverbial icing on top. 

‘The most important criterion for a sea captain's wife was a woman who was used to waiting in a household of women for her husband's ship to sail to harbour.’

The Sea Captain’s Wife is another excellent book for lovers of historical fiction as it is really quite unique with its societal contrasting observations. Jackie really is a master of cleverly combining a great tale from the past with strong female characters who invariably are seeking to uncover a mystery. 

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This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.

 

Review: The Talented Mrs Greenway

Title: The Talented Mrs Greenway

Author: Tea Cooper

Publisher: 1st November 2023 by Harlequin Australia, HQ & MIRA

Pages: 350 pages

Genre: historical fiction 

Rating: 4.5 cups

Synopsis:

From a bestselling Australian author, this compellingly realised novel brings to life the story of an enigmatic figure, wife to feted colonial architect Francis Greenway, and asks, whose hand really shaped Sydney? Who is the talented Mrs Greenway?

1814 Sydney When Mary Greenway, freshly arrived from the old country, steps into the maelstrom of Sydney Town with three children at her skirts, she has high hopes of a new beginning, despite having little money and a husband in irons. After all, the sudden death of her sadistic first husband has meant freedom from her gilded cage and Francis Greenway is an architect of some promise, under the protection of Admiral Phillip himself. Mary herself is a woman of great resources and an even greater creative passion, a passion that will surely burn through anything that the filthy, burgeoning, vitality of colonial Sydney can throw at her. Soon ensconced in a tiny cottage in George Street, Mary sets about moulding a life for her family from the unpromising clay of this new colony, with a determination fired in equal parts by guilt for her disastrous past action that nearly brought ruin to them all and desire to see her true calling realised. When she is befriended by Elizabeth Macquarie it seems that fate is smiling on them with the promise of a better life in her grasp. But fate is a difficult mistress and with past secrets to keep, and current betrayals on the brink of discovery, the stakes are higher than ever. With Mary's grip on this new life slipping, will her past lies come back to haunt her?

My Thoughts

Tea Cooper has delivered once again! Just like in her previous works, Tea’s latest offering, The Talented Mrs Greenway,  is yet another engaging and masterfully crafted story. Not only does Tea’s latest tale provide a truly engaging story about the early days of colonial Sydney but also she melds fact and fiction to present yet another strong female character from history. 

‘Is there any way I can help?’ 

‘You? How can you help? I am the government architect.’ 

‘And I am the architect’s wife.’

Tea is to be congratulated for presenting such a rich and comprehensive tale. The settings both in England and Australia are authentic, particularly with the incorporation of real life events such as those occurring during Governor Macquarie’s leadership. It is the everyday cultural feel of everything from the early days of George Street, to unmade roads, to the humid heat of a Sydney summer -  Tea effortlessly includes the reader seamlessly into her riveting tale.

‘… her name may never be recorded but nothing, nothing could take away this moment, the sense of achievement and pride coursing through her.’

What is truly special here is how little Tea had to go on. Yes, this is a thoroughly researched tale of Sydney’s early days, however, of Mary Greenway herself, Tea had little to go on. To so cleverly reimagine how events could have played out was a masterstroke! I knew of Francis Greenway (loved the eccentric take on this man) and his role as architect in many of the early constructed buildings. So, how imaginative and brave to take a few facts and turn it around into a completely believable tale, weaving fiction and fact together, to present the woman behind the man. Well done Tea!

‘We may not be able to publicly admit your role but it should be acknowledged between ourselves. My talented wife - what would I do without you?’

From strong protagonists, to family and social drama , to taking in the early days of colonial Sydney - I can highly recommend the tale that is, The Talented Mrs Greenway.

‘Perhaps in one hundred years’ time she too would be remembered.’

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.

 

Review: Keepers of the Lighthouse

Title: Keepers of the Lighthouse

Author: Kaye Dobbie

Publisher: 3rd August 2022 by Harlequin Australia, HQ & MIRA

Pages: 320 pages

Genre: historical fiction

My Rating: 5 cups

Synopsis:

A lonely windswept lighthouse island in Bass Strait hides a dangerous secret hundreds of years in the making ... Secrets and sabotage keep readers guessing in the new novel from Australian author Kaye Dobbie.

1882 

Laura Webster and her father are the stalwart keepers of Benevolence Island Lighthouse, a desolate place stranded in the turbulent Bass Strait. When a raging storm wrecks a schooner just offshore, the few survivors take shelter with the Websters, awaiting rescue from the mainland. But some of the passengers have secrets that lead to dreadful consequences, the ripples of which echo far into the future ...

2020 

Nina and her team of volunteers arrive on Benevolence to work on repairs, with plans to open up the island to tourists. Also on the expedition, for reason of his own, is Jude Rawlins, a man Nina once loved. A man who once destroyed her.

But the idyllic location soon turns into a nightmare as random acts of sabotage leave them with no communication to the mainland and the sense of someone on the island who shouldn't be there.

The fingers of those secrets from the passengers lost long ago are reaching into the present, and Nina will never be the same again ...

My Thoughts

I am such a fan of Kaye’s work having thoroughly enjoyed her previous historical fiction tales. Her latest, Keepers of the Lighthouse is no exception, in fact, I think it might be her best yet as it was such an intriguing mystery (twice over) that I found hard to put down!

‘…neither Laura nor her father could leave the lighthouse. There were lives at stake out there on the wild water. Lives that were in their hands.’

This dual time narrative just oozes with atmosphere in both the historic and contemporary tales. On a lonely isolated island stands a lighthouse where storms and secrets, dangers and revelations come to pass. Based on a real island in Bass Strait, you will be sure to feel the wind whipping through your hair and watch helplessly as ships become wrecked on the ragged rocks. Could there ever be a more perfect setting for mysteries, past and present, to arise and fill the occupants' lives with drama and danger? The two timelines: 1882 and 2020 (with occasional flashbacks to 2010) work so well together with the final connective revelations fantastic! You will be on the edge of your reading chair, furiously flipping the pages to see how all the pieces of this puzzle will fit together. And it does …. and I loved it!

Both timelines present tales of fortitude and dedication on the one hand with greed and jealousy on the other. There is romance (both past and present) but it fits in so well with the events unfolding. I loved Laura’s character with her love for the island and its way of life. Lonely? Bored? Never!

‘There is much to do here, but apart from tending the light, I make my own decisions. I value my freedom.' 'Is it freedom? You live on an island far away from the rest of the world. Many people would see that as effectively a prison. Aren't you lonely? Bored?' 

 

Keepers of the Lighthouse is a fabulous tale full of mystery and intrigue set against the wonderful backdrop of a lighthouse on an isolated island. With rich and vivid descriptions, characters to cheer and characters to curse, this is a tale that truly captivated me.

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.

Review: The Secret World of Connie Starr

Title: The Secret World of Connie Starr

Author: Robbi Neal

Publisher: 1st June 2022 by Harlequin Australia, HQ & MIRA

Pages: 384 pages

Genre: historical fiction

My Rating: 3 cups

Synopsis:

A stunning evocation of Australian life through the war to the 1950s, this novel is intimate and sweeping, immediate and dreamlike - a magical rendering of darkness and joy, and the beauty inherent in difference. 

Connie Starr was always a difficult child. Her mother knew as soon as Connie entered the world that day in Ballarat in 1934 and opened her lungs to scream, there was more chaos in the world than before and it wouldn't leave until Connie did. From the safety of a branch high in her lemon tree where she speaks to angels, she sees the world for what it is - a swirling mass of beauty and darkness, of trauma and family, of love and war and truth and lies - lies that might just undo her and drive her to a desperate act.

This ambitious, complex and insightful novel intertwines numerous stories of lives from before World War II and beyond, recreating with intimacy and breadth a world that is now lost to us. This book is a brightly coloured patchwork quilt of everything from shoes to polio, lemon trees to rivers, death to life that melds into one beautiful, luminous work of art.

My Thoughts

The Secret World of Connie Starr is an Australian historical drama set from 1939 to 1955 and covers a wide range of topics and social issues of the era. It provides a window into what life was like living in a small town during WWII and the years immediately after. 

‘Connie, sitting on her branch, picked herself a lemon and sucked out the sweet juice and sat there, hidden, watching the world from her secret place. Because that was how Connie was in the world: apart.’

With Connie spending time high in her lemon tree she observes family, friends and neighbours going about their daily lives - and it is these lives that the book highlights more than Connie herself. Connie is but one character and a solid explanation behind her secret world is amiss. Rather it is with this large cast of characters that all events of the various challenges of living are played out. At times it is hard to keep your head engaged with them all and what occurs. It is interesting from the historical perspective of living through the Depression, war years and beyond. I wanted to enjoy it more but not being drawn to anyone in particular it was a challenge to get through at times. 

‘Oh, Connie,’ he murmured. ‘I love that you see things other people don’t see, that you write your own story.’

This is a book about life in Australia during this time period - the many hardships, love and laughter, secrets and sadness. Connie does not fit in and lacks support from those around her and suffers accordingly. Through these events readers get to witness how ordinary people coped and survived. Sad and nostalgic, informative and revealing of a time from the past. 

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.

Review: Dressed By Iris

Title: Dressed By Iris

Author: Mary-Anne O'Connor

Publisher: 2nd February 2022 by Harlequin Australia, HQ & MIRA

Pages: 492 pages

How I Read It: ARC book

Genre: historical fiction 

My Rating: 4.5 cups

Synopsis:

A vivid, romantic story of Sydney in the 1930s Depression - the heartbreak, the glamour, the dark underbelly, the struggle towards a better day - and one young woman's dream of designing her way from rags to riches. For readers of Natasha Lester and Victoria Purman.

1930: Seventeen-year-old Iris Mitchell dreams of designing clothes, but there's little spare cash for fashion in their shanty-town home. The gift of a single purple ribbon from would-be boyfriend John Tucker, however, creates an unexpected opportunity ... and when Iris's brother Jim joins the Sydney Harbour Bridge construction, the large, dirt-poor but loving Mitchell family can move to the city. Iris will be torn away from John, but he's Protestant and she's Catholic, taboo in their world, so perhaps it wasn't meant to be ...

1932: By day, Iris scrubs the floors at Caron's, an upmarket department store. By night, she designs and sews in her family's tiny, crowded house. Friendship with gorgeous, livewire Natasha, one of Caron's models, allows Iris to show her skills, but will her talent be acknowledged ... or exploited?

When John reappears, passions are reignited, and Iris must face not only their religious divide, but the apparent impossibility of having both marriage and a career. Meanwhile, the Mitchells must navigate life in a city riven by corruption, dirty politics and gambling. Will their faith, determination and deep family bond save them when tragedy and adversity strike? In 1930s Sydney, the stakes have never been higher ...

My Thoughts

‘The girl from the shantytown was going to seize this opportunity, and if she defied every odd and became wealthy and successful no-one could ever touch her.’

Dressed By Iris is another wonderful Australian saga by author Mary-Anne O’Connor. Set in the 1930s it covers everything from the Great Depression to the building of the iconic Sydney Harbour Bridge. Having read Mary-Anne’s other books, I knew she would once more provide her readers with strong female characters and I was not disappointed. 

Mary-Anne does a wonderful job of capturing the life of average Australians from the era. The main focus here is on the Mitchell family - poor Irish Catholics who not only faced great poverty but also great prejudice. It is the eldest daughter, Iris, who has an incredible talent for fashion creations, which Mary-Anne highlights inclusive of the exploitation and sexism surrounding the industry at the time. It brings with it glamour that perfectly balances out the harsh reality of life for many.

‘You should have let me say something,’ he said. 

‘What can you say? That you’re Protestant? That would only make things worse.’ 

John shook his head. ‘What the hell is wrong with people?’ 

Iris sighed. ‘It’s only words. Sticks and stones...’ 

‘But, it’s not, is it? It’s attitude. Belief.’ He looked over at her. ‘It does just as much harm. Maybe more.’

The joy of this book though is through the interactions of the Mitchell family. What a joy! The way they unite through challenging times and just how important love and support is especially given the crippling circumstances of the time. Iris’ mother, Agnes, was the foundation and very heart of the family from her cooking to her enormous courage proving inspirational. The inclusion of Natasha, Iris’ friend, was a pure delight - not only her mannerisms, support, encouragement but her humour was a definite highlight.

Mary-Anne’s, ‘Author’s Note’, at the conclusion shed light on her inspiration and how some characters had been modelled on family members. It also explained certain correlations of the fiction and facts surrounding some of the key aspects from her story. All up, Dressed By Iris provided a wonderful window into the Australia of the early 1930s with detailed depictions of one girl’s dream combined with the unwavering faith, love and support of her family. A joy to read.

‘What should we drink to?’ 

‘Mum,’ Iris said. 

‘Oh no, not me,’ Agnes said, ‘I think we should drink to Iris. This is her dream.’ 

‘It’s yours too,’ Iris pointed out. ‘It’s all of ours now.’ 

‘To dreams then,’ Jim said. 

‘Yes,’ Iris said, looking over at John and smiling. ‘To dreams coming true.’

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.