Skylarking

A haunting and amazing read, this one left me breathless when it ended. This debut is based on the true story of two girls, Kate Gibson and Harriet Parker, daughters of lighthouse keepers who are the very best of friends on the cusp of young adulthood while growing up along the coast of Jervis Bay Territory Australia in 1887. Told mostly through the eyes of Kate she tells us this story of two friends who share their secrets, dreams and wishes as they begin to grow into young women noticing their budding womanhood and feeling their first yearnings of attraction, jealousy and betrayal when a young fisherman, McPhail comes to settle amidst their families. Beautifully written and descriptive, the author has you smell the briny air of the coast, see the rocky landscape along the shores and feel the homespun warmth and comfort as Kate and her mother bake their breads and pies for the men who work at the lighthouse. Without giving away any more details because I want other readers to experience this it is truly a wonderful read that is not be missed, I just couldn't put it down till I finished! Highly recommended.

Thank you to Kate Mildenhall for this fabulous read that is still haunting me as I write this review and to NetGalley for this copy in exchange for an honest review.

I had tagged Skylarking as a To Read book in Goodreads but couldn’t remember anything about it when I actually started reading it (thanks to Netgalley for the ARC). I’m glad I didn’t have any memories of the synopsis and that I went into it blind.

From the beginning the book is practically mesmerizing. The story follows best friends Kate and Harriet as they live on a remote cape in southern Australia in the late 19th century, where Kate’s father is the lighthouse keeper. The prose flows so well, and I felt like I was there with them. Although life was certainly tough at the time it still seemed like a relatively charmed life. As Kate and Harriet grew into teenagers we had an insight into the tumultuous thoughts and emotions of Kate, as narrator, which I could certainly relate to, even now in the 21st century.

Suspense builds as the reader is told that eventually Harriet will not be there. Was I shocked by the actual event? Not really. I think I was underwhelmed. I think that it was more interesting to think of the Love Interest as more of a vehicle to show how the relationship between the girls changed, rather than the one thing that ultimately led to tragedy.

Very well done. I look forward to reading future work by this author.

This first novel is inspired by the true story of two friends, Kate Gibson and Harriet Parker. They were the daughters of lighthouse keepers, who grew up together, in a small, isolated community on the coast of Australia’s Jervis Bay Territory, late in the 19th century.

Certain facts are public record; the story that underpins those facts is imagined.

I love that this is a story of female friendship, very firmly rooted in a particular time and a place that the author had taken time and trouble to understand. And that it was told in one voice, a voice that always rang true, and that told the story from start to finish, with no shifts in time and no digressions.

The younger of the two girls, Kate, tells her story.

Her world is a small one, and she only really knows the families of the other men who work at the lighthouse with her father. There are a few fishermen who have settled nearby and just about make a living, and there are native people who live a little further away; but there is nobody else. That makes the friendship between the two girls particularly precious.

Kate is bright, bookish, brave, and loves to explore the world around her while she waits to grow up and have the kind of adventures, and see the kind of places, that she has only read about in books. She is eager to explore every bit of the world open to her – cliffs, beaches, grasslands – but her friend lacks her natural agility and confidence, and so she struggles to keep up and occasionally get into difficulties. Harriet is calm, quiet and much more cautious; and she dreams not of adventure but of a husband, a home and a family of her own.

‘Even though the peppery scent of the scrub on that headland ran through my blood, I knew that there must be other places that would thrill me. And while I hoped that Harriet would be by my side as I ventured off into the great unknown, I knew this was unlikely, Where I had dreams of boats and pirates and coral island adventures, Harriet saw a future of home and hearth …’

The details of their world and their lives are quite beautifully drawn; it is clear that that the author has researched and that she has understood, and she has woven what she learned into the story she in a way that feels completely natural and right. I had a lovely time watching the way the small community worked and all of the domestic details, but, for me, it was when Kate was exploring her world that the story really sang.

I could pick up the sea saltiness in the air, I could feel the breeze; I could see grass and flowers give way to cliffs, and the beach below ; I knew exactly how it felt to move through the world that Kate knew so well.

Although I am on a different coast on the other side of the world it felt so like home, and it brought this painting to mind:

(Amanda Hoskin – View of St Michael’s Mount from the Fields)

A newcomer would unsettle the friendship between the two girls. He was a young fisherman who came closer to the community around the lighthouse then others did. Each girls is drawn to him, but he responds to them and treats them quite differently. Kate is jealous, and Harriet is reluctant to talk.

Then her family sends Harriet to visit relations in Melbourne, because they want her to meet more people and see other possibilities before she makes any decisions about her future. Kate is thrown into the company of the local boys and younger children, and she misjudges situations and makes mistakes.

Her behaviour is far from laudable, but I recognised her emotions and I understood her actions.

Tension grew, and my head was full of questions about what was happening, what would happen.

There were maybe too many questions, but that was, at least in part, because the facts that this story is spun around are difficult to explain.

I have to say that is a weakness; but I also have to say that all the things she did well in the book – the way she drew me into a world, a community and a story- tell me that Kate Mildenhall will write something quite wonderful when she finds the right story to tell.

I was captivated by this book; and so I’m hoping that one isn’t too far away …

3.5. Absolutely beautiful setting, described wonderfully. An isolated Cape in Australia, a lighthouse keeper, his family and a few others that live on the Cape, and two girls with a friendship they hope will last forever. Days filled with fun, adventure, secrets, chores too of course, but we all grow up. A new young man arrives on the Cape, and this and he will change things between the girls, create a fissure in their friendship.

It is rare these days to find a story told in a straightforward manner, loved that this is one told in such a way. The tone is melancholy, reminds me a bit of [book:Picnic at Hanging Rock|791345], another fictionalized account of an actual happening. To see how these early families lived, how they handled the mostly solitary nature of their lives, their daily habits, was fascinating. The different ways grief was handled, and the forgiving nature of some, poignant. All in all a good imagining of a true tragedy.

ARC from Netgalley.

I loved this book! Based on a true event in an isolated Cape in Australia, it explores the coming of age and friendship between two girls as they grow older and Kate's hope that their friendship will last forever. The book is seen from Kate's perspective, and as such I did identify more with her than Harriet. I loved how their friendship is shown to include jealousies and the growth of secret keeping as they start to experience things at a different pace.

I personally didn't know that this was based on a real event, so I didn't understand the significant of the book title, but there was tension keeping me reading throughout. There was a sense that something was coming, especially as there are moments throughout where Kate looks back on the events with lines like "If I had known what was coming..." or "Little did we know that this was...". In some regard, they were quite jarring to the sense of the novel because I was thrown out of the situation of the book, but they did continue the tension.

I just loved this book so much.

Beautifully written, well balanced chapters and a captivating story.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of the book.