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![A Room Made of Leaves by [Kate Grenville]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51NqXOTxIsL._SY346_.jpg)
A Room Made of Leaves Kindle Edition
Kate Grenville (Author) Find all the books, read about the author, and more. See search results for this author |
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What if Elizabeth Macarthur—wife of the notorious John Macarthur, wool baron in the earliest days of Sydney—had written a shockingly frank secret memoir? And what if novelist Kate Grenville had miraculously found and published it? That’s the starting point for A Room Made of Leaves, a playful dance of possibilities between the real and the invented.
Marriage to a ruthless bully, the impulses of her heart, the search for power in a society that gave women none: this Elizabeth Macarthur manages her complicated life with spirit and passion, cunning and sly wit. Her memoir lets us hear—at last!—what one of those seemingly demure women from history might really have thought.
At the centre of A Room Made of Leaves is one of the most toxic issues of our own age: the seductive appeal of false stories. This book may be set in the past, but it’s just as much about the present, where secrets and lies have the dangerous power to shape reality.
Kate Grenville’s return to the territory of The Secret River is historical fiction turned inside out, a stunning sleight of hand by one of our most original writers.
Kate Grenville is one of Australia’s 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. Grenville’s other novels include Sarah Thornhill, The Lieutenant, Dark Places and the Orange Prize winner The Idea of Perfection. Her most recent books are two works of non-fiction, One Life: My Mother’s Story and The Case Against Fragrance. She has also written three books about the writing process. In 2017 Grenville was awarded the Australia Council Award for Lifetime Achievement in Literature. She lives in Melbourne.
‘There is no doubt Grenville is one of our greatest writers’ Sunday Mail
‘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, Grenville’s 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
‘Her fiction is always a challenge, a goad to our complacencies, social decorums and repressions…Richly imagined…[Provides] the shock we perhaps need to remind us of what might still be possible.’ Age/Sydney Morning Herald
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherText Publishing
- Publication date2 July 2020
- File size2470 KB
Product description
Book Description
About the Author
Kate Grenville's bestselling novel The Secret River received the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Miles Franklin Literary Award. The Idea of Perfection won the Orange Prize. Grenville's other novels include Sarah Thornhill, The Lieutenant, Lilian's Story, Dark Places and Joan Makes History.
www.kategrenville.com
Review
Kate Grenville spins a delicately teasing novel about the inherent untrustworthiness of the official record . . . beautiful and subtle ― * Financial Times *
Grenville cleverly uses Elizabeth's bland and pleasant missives home, showing that they were a carefully constructed fiction. The real Elizabeth - passionate, clever and endlessly resilient - is brilliantly conjured ― * The Times *
Kate Grenville gives voice to this reticent woman, allowing her smart, sparky, shrewd heroine a chance "at last to speak" . . . eloquent [and] evocative ― * Daily Mail *
The absorbing story of a woman discovering herself in the vast expanse of a new world, told in rich, insightful prose ― * Sunday Times *
Vivid, lyrical and engrossing. Both authentic and imaginative, the voice of the female narrator quietly challenges not only conventional historical narratives but our whole idea of what history is about -- ALICE JOLLY
Evocative . . . [A] gorgeous, generous novel ― * Sunday Express *
Historical fiction at its best . . . breathtaking . . . [Elizabeth is a] plucky, sharp-minded young woman ― * Good Housekeeping *
Elizabeth Macarthur manages her complicated life with spirit and passion, cunning and sly wit . . . Kate Grenville's return to the territory of The Secret River is historical fiction turned inside out, a stunning sleight of hand by one of our most original writers ― * Australian Arts Review *
An imaginative depiction of a relationship forged in the earliest days of the Australian colony . . . an engaging book -- ERICA WAGNER ― * Guardian * --This text refers to the paperback edition.
Product details
- ASIN : B084RSFH8F
- Publisher : Text Publishing (2 July 2020)
- Language : English
- File size : 2470 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Print length : 319 pages
- Page numbers source ISBN : 1922330027
- Best Sellers Rank: 1,405 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

Kate Grenville (kategrenville.com) was born in Sydney, Australia. She's published eight books of fiction, including the multiple prize-winners 'The Secret River', 'The Lieutenant', 'The Idea of Perfection', and 'Lilian's Story'. She's also published three books about the writing process that are classic texts for Creative Writing classes, and a memoir about the research and writing of 'The Secret River'.
Grenville writes about Australia, but her themes are universal: love, violence, and survival. Her characters are often inspired by real historical characters: her own nineteenth century convict ancestor, an early Australian settler; a bag-lady on the streets of 1950s Sydney who quotes Shakespeare for a living; a soldier in the Sydney of 1788 who shares an extraordinary friendship of tenderness and respect with a young Aboriginal girl.
Grenville's international prizes include the Orange Award, the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, and a shortlisting for the Man Booker Prize. Her books have been published all over the world and translated into many languages, and two have been made into feature films.
Learn more about Kate Grenville, her books, and how to get hold of them, at kategrenville.com.
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I did enjoy the first few chapters, about Elizabeth's childhood. Grenville's prose style is beautiful. However, I think of all her books, this is the least successful although it's certainly an easy read and reasonably entertaining.
For me, Grenville's portrayal of the characters was a bit one-dimensional. None of them rang true. Mrs Macarthur and her husband were almost caricatures. Elizabeth was too good to be true - although history does portray her as a woman of intelligence, diligence, grace and VIRTUE. History shows her husband as argumentative, irascible and difficult to like. However, in this book he had no redeeming qualities at all. The secondary characters also came across as 'types' rather than believable human beings.
History shows that even though Macarthur was away for some time and Elizabeth was left in charge, he was an astute businessman and his letters to her show his considerable interest and control of the breeding and marketing of fine wool. There is no doubt that she also played an equally, if not more important part, but his role cannot be discounted. This book seems to want to do just that.
If you are going to write a fictional, historical biographical romance, and this book is total fiction - there were no letters - why would you choose a woman who is well known in Australian history and turn her into an 18th century Mills & Boon heroine.
History tells us that Elizabeth and Dawes were friends, but she was also a particular friend of Governor Philip. There is nothing to say that they were lovers. And in the tiny Colony that was Sydney in the 1790s, it would have been virtually impossible for someone as well known as Elizabeth Macarthur to have such a full-on affair - even a small flirtation would have been noticed I would imagine.
I think Grenville has done Mrs Macarthur a disservice. This to me was popular fiction and I think it would have worked well as just that, if it had been about a fictional heroine.
While much of the narrative draws a clear picture of life in Sydney, the most atmospheric parts are in the sea journey half way across the world.
Grenville's writing imbues Mrs Macarthur with modern feminist sensibilities, while capturing the challenges of life for a woman of her time. I did find the inconsistencies in the main character irritating - more so because of the use of the first person narrative style. She explains away these inconsistencies quite glibly - Eliza's husband reads her letters - but fails to really appreciate the life of privilege she has in the town.
Granville makes no claim to the story being accurate and admits to being "slippery" with the truth. However she does weave facts in and out of the narrative - especially about treatment of aboriginal people, but her melding of several governors and officials into one, and her glossing over of some important historical events is what grates.
As a novel it is entertaining enough, but rather less substantial than others by the same author.
In reading this account of Elizabeth Maccarthur's life, it has made me want to know more about Australia's earliest colonists and what they achieved.
Top reviews from other countries

I purchased this book with the notion that I would be reading a fictional story, this meant I was met with surprise when I read at the beginning the editor’s note which described the findings of Elizabeth’s story within a roof cavity and this book would be her story, her words. This thrilled me immediately, and I devoured the book intently. I felt as though I was living through her, I had traveled back in time to this unknown land and all of a sudden history was been stitched together in front of me. However, upon reading the authors notes at the end of the book I discovered that in fact the story that I had just read was actual fiction and the editors notes at the beginning where in fact false. The world of Elizabeth that I had created to exist in apart of my brain that was so rich and full of vivid beauty and truth was all of a sudden covered in a dark mist, I know I sound dramatic but it feels fraudulent to some degree. Maybe I’m the fool for believing too quickly.


I was really hoping for a feminist novel that served the time Elizabeth MacArthur lived in but I found that it made its main character too knowledgeable of modern feminism and too quick to look down her nose at the brutal life in colonial Australia. This does indigenous people an injustice as well.
I didn’t like the Elizabeth of this novel and I don’t think it serves her brilliance well. She was simply amazing to do what she did and within the restrictions of her time. If the author had written of her influence of her husband more sincerely, it would have been more believable. I love Kate Grenville but I do not love this novel.

