An excellent novel about the seizure of aboriginal lands by pardoned convicts from the British penal colony in New South Wales in the early 1800s, The Secret River could just as easily be the story of the extermination of Native Americans in early 19th century United States, or of the Spanish conquests in South America, or of the European colonization of India and Africa. Grenville is an Australian, but her story is a universal one.
She begins with a truly Dickensian tale of Londoner William Thornhill, from his horribly impoverished childhood, to his hard life as waterman on the Thames and his marriage to childhood sweetheart Sal, to the desperate and bungled attempt at a waterfront theft that led to his transportation—with family in tow—to the feared penal colony in eastern Australia. There is enough story already for a dozen novels, but Grenville has only just begun. Learning how to survive by exploiting the venality and corruption of the colony, Thornhill secures his pardon within a few years. But while Sal pines for a return to the familiarity of the London streets , Thornhill knows only too well that a convict with nothing to return to cannot support a growing family and sets his sights instead on a spit of prime undeveloped New South Wales land along the Hawkesbury River.
Very quickly, however, the Thornhills discover that the land, while undeveloped, is not unclaimed but has belonged to the indigenous people of the area for thousands of years, and that they have no intention of leaving without a fight. Attempts at coexistence are sabotaged, and tensions rapidly escalate. Grenville’s portrayals of the Thornhills’ white neighbors along the river—from Mr. Blackwood who takes an Indian wife to “Smasher” Sullivan whose racist terror of the Indians turns to unspeakable brutality—are perhaps a bit too studied, but nonetheless effectively set the stage for Thornhill’s own crisis of conscience. No one comes out clean, not Thornhill and not the Indians, but as Grenville–who has a convict ancestor of her own–said about researching and writing this book, The Secret River is intended as her apology to the aboriginals.
The Secret River is the first in a trilogy of novels, but also a standalone story with a powerful statement to make and one well worth hearing.