Restless Dolly Maunder

(Hardback)

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Description

Dolly Maunder was born at the end of the nineteenth century, when societys long-locked doors were finally starting to creak ajar for women. Born into a poor farming family in country New South Wales but clever, energetic and determined, she spent her restless life pushing at those doors.

Most women like Dolly have more or less disappeared from view, remembered only in a family photo album as a remote figure in impossible clothes, and maybe for a lemon-pudding recipe. Restless Dolly Maunder brings one of them to life as a person we can recognise and whose struggles we can empathise with.

In this novel, Kate Grenville uses family memories and research to imagine her way into the life of her grandmother. This is the story of a woman born into a world of limits and obstacles who was ablethough at a costto make a life for herself. Her battles and triumphs helped to open doors for the women who came after.

Reviews

There is no doubt Grenville is one of our greatest writers. -- Sunday Mail
[Grenville] is a gift of a writer. -- Age

ExcellentSo beautifully observed and writtenAn accomplished novel with all the experience that a writer like Kate Grenville brings to her workReally a superb piece of work.

-- Leigh Sales on A Room Made of Leaves

Kate Grenville is a literary alchemist, turning the leaden shadow of the historical Elizabeth Macarthur into a luminescent, golden woman for our times. Intelligent, compassionate, strategic and dead sexy, Grenvilles Macarthur is an unforgettable character who makes us question everything we thought we knew about our colonial past. A polished gem of a novel by a writer who is as brave as she is insightful. I simply loved it.

-- Clare Wright on A Room Made of Leaves

FabulousIt will delight you and it will keep you company during lockdown. But it will also make you think deeply about home and belonging and our hidden and brutal colonial past. And although Kate implores us to not believe too quickly, I would like you to please believe me when I declare that you will adore this book.

-- Melanie Cheng on A Room Made of Leaves

Vividly rendered, warmly sympathetic, daring in speculative breadth: a full-length portrait in oils of a woman known to most of us only in profile miniatureIf Grenvilles novel is inspired by provocation, it unfolds as a feeling, organic story.

-- Australian on A Room Made of Leaves

Author Bio

Kate Grenville is one of Australias most celebrated writers. Her international bestseller The Secret River was awarded local and overseas prizes, has been adapted for the stage and as an acclaimed television miniseries, and is now a much-loved classic. Grenvilles other novels include Sarah Thornhill, The Lieutenant, Dark Places and the Orange Prize winner The Idea of Perfection. Her recent non-fiction includes One Life: My Mothers Story, The Case Against Fragrance and Elizabeth Macarthurs Letters. Her most recent novel is the bestselling A Room Made of Leaves. She has also written three books about the writing process. In 2017 Grenville was awarded the Australia Council Award for Lifetime Achievement in Literature.
kategrenville.com.au