The Wives of Henry Oades
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3.0 • 1 Rating
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- $8.99
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- $8.99
Publisher Description
In 1899 Henry Oades discovers he has two wives – and many dilemmas…
In 1890, Henry Oades decided to undertake the arduous sea voyage from England to New Zealand in order to further his family's fortunes. Here they settled on the lush but wild coast – although it wasn't long before disaster struck in the most unexpected of ways.
A local Maori tribe, incensed at their treatment at the hands of the settlers, kidnapped Mrs Oades and her four children, and vanished into the rugged hills surrounding the town. Henry searched ceaselessly for his family, but two grief-stricken years later was forced to conclude that they must be dead. In despair he shipped out to San Francisco to start over, eventually falling in love with and marrying a young widow.
In the meantime, Margaret Oades and her children were leading a miserable existence, enslaved to the local tribe. When they contracted smallpox they were cast out and, ill and footsore, made their way back to town, five years after they were presumed dead.
Discovering that Henry was now half a world away, they were determined to rejoin him. So months later they arrived on his doorstep in America and Henry Oades discovered that he had two wives and many dilemmas …
This is a darkly comic but moving historical fiction debut about love and family, based on a controversial court case from the early 1900s.
Reviews
'A beguiling, promising debut. Serious, sometimes horrific developments are lightened by touches of understated, salty wit in Moran’s fact-based historical, a fresh and unusual story.' Kirkus Reviews
'Intriguing and evocative…It’s Margaret surviving the wilderness, Nancy overcoming grief and the two women bonding that give this book its heart and should make this a book group winner' Publishers Weekly
'Equal parts love story and courtroom drama, Johanna Moran's “The Wives of Henry Oades” is a compelling story of good people caught in impossible circumstances, and a community that rushes to judge rather than to understand.' Meg Waite Clayton, author of the bestseller “The Wednesday Sisters”
'A stellar debut novel. A delicious and painful tale of marriage, suffering, tolerance and sacrifice – a historical saga seen through the lens of two wives, one husband, and the disapproving, cantankerous rabble at the end of Victorian America.' Jamie Ford, bestselling author of “Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet”
About the author
Johanna Moran lives in Florida with her husband, John. She has travelled extensively, working as a Pan Am stewardess, and has visited all the places mentioned in this book. She first came across this story through her father, a professor of law. The Wives of Henry Oadesis her first book.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
An English accountant and his two wives are the subject of this intriguing and evocative debut novel based on a real-life 19th-century California bigamy case. A loving husband and attentive father, Henry Oades assures his wife, Margaret, that his posting to New Zealand will be temporary and the family makes the difficult journey. But during a Maori uprising, Margaret and her four children are kidnapped and the Oades's house is torched. Convinced his family is dead, Henry relocates to California and marries Nancy, a sad 20-year-old pregnant widow. When Margaret and the children escape, eventually making their way to California and Henry's doorstep, he does the decent thing by being a husband to both wives and father to all their offspring, a situation deemed indecent by the Berkeley Daughters of Decency. Moran presents Henry's story as if making a case in court, facts methodically revealed with just enough detail for the reader to form an independent opinion. But it's Margaret surviving the wilderness, Nancy overcoming grief and the two women bonding that give the book its heart and should make this a book group winner.
