Title: The Inaugural Meeting of the Fairvale Ladies Book Club
Series: -
Author: Sophie Green
Description: In 1978 the Northern Territory has begun to
self-govern. Cylcone Tracy is a recent memory and telephones not yet a fixture
on the cattle station dominating the rugged outback. Life is hard and people
are isolated. But they find ways to connect.
Sybil is the matriarch of Fairvale Station run by her husband Joe. Their
eldest son, Lachlan, was Joe’s designated successor by the has left the Territory,
for good. It is up to their second son Ben to take his place. But that doesn’t
stop Sybil grieving for absence of her child. With her oldest friend Rita, now
living in Alice springs and working for the Royal Flying Doctor Service, and
Ben’s English wife Kate, finding it difficult to adjust to life at Fairvale,
Sybil comes up with a way to give them all companionship and purpose: they all
love to read, and she forms a book club.
Mother-of-three Sallyanne is invited to join them. Sallyanne dreams of a
life far removed from the dusty town of Katherine where she lives with her
difficult husband Mick. Completing the group is Della, who left Texas for
Australia looking for adventure and work on the land.
Review: The novel is set in Australia, in the late 1970s and follows five women
who share a love for books. Author Sophie Green alternates between the women,
so you quickly get to know them well. My favorite characters were Della and
Rita, who were described most lifelike. But overall, the characters were so
very similar to each other, they didn’t feel unique. Their lives weren’t
similar though, each of them had their struggles and bumps in the road they had to
deal with. Which made it more interesting to read about them.
I always love reading books about books or book clubs. And since it is
in the title, I was very excited to read this. The actual book club is only a
very small part of this story. It’s more about the women’s lives and the book
club is the connection between the five women. I found that very disappointing,
especially since the overall story isn’t very special.
I did enjoy the book quite a bit, it was very easy to get through and I
liked getting to know the five women. But it’s a forgettable one and I was
disappointed about the book club aspect of the novel, which is not very
present. I still think many people will enjoy this book, because I also did. In
the end it was just okay, not bad but not great either.
Rating: 3/ 5
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