The release date for the English version of 'The Exiles' by
Christina Baker Kline is Aug 2020. If you enjoy this novel, it is available for buy as a paperback from Barnes & Noble or Indigo, as an ebook on the Amazon Kindle store, or as an audiobook on Audible.
The ambitious, emotionally stirring novel by the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Orphan Train follows three women whose lives are intertwined in nineteenth-century Australia as they battle for freedom and atonement in a new society.
Evangeline, a teenage governess in early 19th-century London, was seduced by her employer's son and was transported to the infamous Newgate Prison. After her pregnancy was revealed, she was released from prison. She finds out she has been transferred to "the land beyond the seas," Van Diemen's place, an Australian penal colony, after spending months in the filthy, overcrowded cell. Evangeline is unsure of what lies ahead, but she is certain that the child she is carrying will be born during the months-long journey to this far-off place.
Evangeline makes friends with Hazel, a girl a bit older than her previous students who was given a seven-year prison sentence for stealing a silver spoon, while traveling on the converted slave ship Medea. Where Evangeline is guileless, Hazel is a talented herbalist and midwife, and she quickly starts providing home cures to sailors and convicts in exchange for various favors.
Aboriginal people had lived in Australia for over 50,000 years, but in the 1840s, the British government saw the aboriginal as an unwelcome nuisance and declared their nascent colony to be unoccupied and unsettled. Many of them have been forcibly evacuated and their land has been taken by white colonists by the time the Medea arrives. Mathinna, the adoptive daughter of the Lowreenne tribe's chief, is one of the displaced individuals. She was taken in by the new Van Diemen's Land governor.
Through the experiences of Evangeline, Hazel, and Mathinna, Christina Baker Kline skillfully retells the tale of Australia from a new perspective, depicting the beginnings of a new society in a stunning and challenging region in this stunning novel. Although living in Australia can be harsh and unjust, there are many who see it as a chance for independence, a fresh start, or even atonement. The Exiles is a narrative of grace born of adversity, the strong relationships of female friendships, and the unbridled legacy, told in exquisite detail and incisive words.