After a few non-fiction titles, it was a nice change this month to read for review Maya Linnell’s latest rural fiction novel, “Paperbark Hill”. While I have enjoyed the non-fiction books I’ve reviewed, I was ready to lose myself in a fictional world, and this was the perfect escapist genre read. Linnell writes authentically of small town rural Australia, with the characters, landscape and community events immediately recognisable to anyone who has lived in the country.
Linnell’s protagonists are flower farmer Diana and travelling pharmacist Ned, both single parents, who encounter each other in the aftermath of the death of Colin – Ned’s father, and Diana’s mentor for her fledgling flower business. Diana needs someone to work with her to prepare for a celebrity garden book launch, which she hopes will get her flower farm “Darling Dahlias” off to a flying start. Enter Ned, who is looking after his father’s egg farm until his brother gets back from Antarctica, after which he will move on to his next locum pharmacist contract. Cue instant attraction between two people who are not looking for love, with Diana and her four boys still living with the loss of her husband Pete and Ned living a determinedly nomadic life with his two children after his wife decamped for an ashram in India.
The stage is set for rising romantic tension in a small town, complicated by family issues, colourful local characters, business problems, the personal heartaches both Diana and Ned carry, and of course their children. Linnell draws the reader in and pulls you along with Diana and Ned as they navigate this unfamiliar territory. The course of true love never runs smooth, naturally, and while the twists are gently signposted before they happen, this takes nothing away from the well written characters and relationships.
I learned plenty about flower farming and the sweat and beauty and hope involved. I learned a bit about the path junior cricketers take as they strive to move into senior professional careers. I salivated over Diana’s baking and wished for recipes at the back of the book, laughed at Ned as Santa at the local Christmas concert, cringed as Diana’s father-in-law told her how to parent, cheered as Ned rebuilt broken family relationships and groaned as everything fell apart.
I hadn’t read any of Linnell’s books before, and it wasn’t until the author’s acknowledgements at the end that I discovered this is actually the fourth instalment of stories about the fictional McIntyre family. If you’ve read the first ones already, I’m sure you’re keen to jump back into their lives. If you haven’t, you might like to save “Paperbark Hill” for after you’ve read the others. But either way, if you like a good Australian rural romance, do read it.
Author: Maya Linnell
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
ISBN: 9781760879693
Buy through Booktopia
This book review is supported by the Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund.
