Title: Remy O'Shea
Author: Tricia McGill
Published in 2003 by Jacobyte Press
Genre: Historical
IBSN: 1-74100-131-5 paperback
1-74100-133-1 e book
Related Books: Blue Haze
His friends and family call him Remy, or Rem. Australia was now his home, but he was not native born. He was sent to this harsh place as punishment. Because he had been caught stealing food to try to keep his siblings alive, Jeremy O'Shea was branded a criminal. They were orphans, and as such, were all transported as criminals to the harsh and unwelcome climes of Australia, leaving everything they had known behind. Many of the criminals transported like that, were sent to toil under the harsh sun, and near slave conditions on the sheep stations, and still others sweltered in the heat and stifling depths of the mines. Remy was fortunate in that his brother-in-law spoke for him and he was allowed to serve his term on Tiger's station. He could have ended up in the mines, and possibly suffered the fate of many who went there and never came back. If they did return, they were often only husks of their former selves, and most perished within a very few years.
But Fate was conspiring against Remy, and had a whole different set of plans for him. Life can be a cruel mistress, and has thrown Sara, the one girl destined to be the love of his life, into his path when he can do nothing about it. Now he finds himself caught in an untenable position, so Remy leaves the safety of his brother-in-law‘s spread. Tiger hates it when the men drink, and Remy has learned the hard way that drinking doesn't work. The nursemaid's death has brought that point home hard. He sees the hurt and condemnation in his sister‘s eyes, and so Remy heads back to Sydney, a return that brings more misery upon him that what he bargained for in his whole life. Bushrangers attack the wagon train to release one of their comrades that the soldiers have collected on their policing rounds, and they take Remy along. He is, therefore, an unwilling accomplice when he is forced to go on a robbery. His refusal to cooperate, foils the Bushranger’s plans, and Remy uses the botched attempt to escape. He never saw the ravine, but some saw him go over the edge. With that fall, he ought to be dead, Remy thinks he might as well be because he is pretty sure his leg is broken. Only Fate can tell him what will head his way next.
Sara Greenwood was the only child of a cruel and greedy man. Her father had only one goal in life, and that was to secure as much of what the world had to offer for himself. He cared nothing for his wife nor his daughter, and when he heard that there were riches to be made across the mountains, he sold his house, packed up his wife and daughter, and took off to the outback. Sara was separated from everyone she knew, and the few friends that she had managed to make in school were now off making their own lives. She was lonely to the bone, and her mother was poor company. Sara had no love for her weak-willed mother. As a matter of fact, the only emotion she was conscious of was a very strong dislike for the man she called "Father". He was a bully and a heavy handed dictator, bigoted against the very people who made his life so easy. He was bound that his daughter would marry for rank, and so when Sara met Remy O'Shea, she was totally unprepared for the feelings he evoked.
At seventeen, Sara had not experienced much of anything in the way of love. Her mother was cold, cowering and remote, showing little feeling toward her daughter. Her father, on the other hand, was the devil's own. She knew nothing of the kinder and gentler feelings that Rem brought out in her. She was surviving on the edge of fear, because these feelings seemed like a terrible disease to her inexperienced self, and at the same time, made her long for the forbidden. The only clue that she received in this matter, came Remy's sister and brother-in-law, and she realized that what she felt for Remy was love. She also found out that he felt the same way, thus sealing their fates. When news came of the attack on the wagon train, and the subsequent news that Remy was shot in a botched robbery, her father decided that she needed a husband to shake her out of her doldrums. He married her off to a man as bad, if not worse than himself. Hidden behind a facade of gentile civility was her worse nightmare, and a life of humiliation and degradation in Clive's hands stretched out in front of her. Remy couldn't save her either...
Tricia McGill takes us to the Australian colonial period in this rather dark saga of Remy and Sara. Love at first sight does not happen often, and it marks the story of the true love that one knew was forever. The love that binds the two is the key in the story, and Tricia plays you right up to the end. Remy and Sara are unforgettable characters, and their story is one quite typical of 1800's Australia, the justice system of England at the time, and of the true opportunities that lay in the continent down under. Remy O'Shea is told with the boldness of the time, and it is rife with excitement and the adventure inherent in those first people to work on the colonization of a new land. The supporting cast of characters are as vital and vibrant as the story itself, and that makes Remy O'Shea an even more engrossing read. The various vignettes told in the tale help to enlighten the reader, and gives an insight into the history of the continent country.
New people and new places hold danger and excitement, heartbreak and despair for this pair of lovers, and I found their plight to be engrossing, the progression of the story heartbreaking, and the resolution? Well, as to that I shall let you draw your own conclusion, but never fear. Remy O'Shea will leave you wanting nothing but more, and hopefully, Tricia has more like it in the works. Released in 2003 by Jacobye Press, Remy O'Shea is a wonderful and exciting read. I love books where the scenery is vivid, there are characters that "live", and the characters are truly to cheer and boo for. This book has all of that and more. It scores high on the "lost in the story" list, and I had to read it again, keeping in mind that I had to write this review. I greatly enjoyed getting lost in this one, however, and I do not begrudge the extra time. I found it well worth the second read, and you will too. Thanks Tricia, now can I have another???
Yours in good reading,
Rose!
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