image of person or book cover 8668055929834664531.jpg
Image courtesy of publisher's website.
y separately published work icon The Islands single work   novel  
Issue Details: First known date: 2022... 2022 The Islands
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'In the mid-1950s, a small group of Finnish migrants set up camp on Little Rat, a tiny island in an archipelago off the coast of Western Australia. The crayfishing industry is in its infancy, and the islands, haunted though they are by past shipwrecks, possess an indefinable allure.

'Drawn here by tragedy, Onni Saari is soon hooked by the stark beauty of the landscape and the slivers of jutting coral onto which the crayfishers build their precarious huts. Could these reefs, teeming with the elusive and lucrative cray, hold the key to a good life?

'The Islands is the sweeping story of the Saari family: Onni, an industrious and ambitious young man, grappling with the loss of a loved one; his wife Alva, quiet but stoic, seeking a sense of belonging between the ramshackle camps of the islands and the dusty suburban lots of the mainland; and their pensive daughter Hilda, who dreams of becoming the skipper of her own boat. As the Saari's try to build their future in Australia, their lives entwine with those of the fishing families of Little Rat, in myriad and unexpected ways.

'A stunning, insightful story of a search for home.'

Source : publisher's blurb

Notes

  • Author's note: For Mummu and Pappa (Maila and Auno 'Herman' Talviharju) and the Finns of Little Rat.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Crows Nest, North Sydney - Lane Cove area, Sydney Northern Suburbs, Sydney, New South Wales,: Allen and Unwin , 2022 .
      image of person or book cover 8668055929834664531.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 312p.p.
      Note/s:
      • Published February 2022
      ISBN: 9781760878580

Other Formats

  • Large print.
  • Dyslexic edition.
  • Sound recording.

Works about this Work

The Islands by Emily Brugman Review – An Evocative Escape to Australia’s Abrolhos Islands Susan Wyndham , 2022 single work review
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 18 February 2022;

— Review of The Islands Emily Brugman , 2022 single work novel

'Set among a community of Finnish fishers in a little-known part of the country, Brugman’s debut is a sensuous blend of social history and imaginative fiction'

The Islands by Emily Brugman Review – An Evocative Escape to Australia’s Abrolhos Islands Susan Wyndham , 2022 single work review
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 18 February 2022;

— Review of The Islands Emily Brugman , 2022 single work novel

'Set among a community of Finnish fishers in a little-known part of the country, Brugman’s debut is a sensuous blend of social history and imaginative fiction'

Last amended 14 Nov 2022 12:38:31
Settings:
  • Western Australia,
  • 1955
Newspapers:
    Powered by Trove
    X