Steamboat Heather

1. Story Statement I have based my novel on a captivating and under-represented time in the historical fiction genre: England’s mass deportation to Australia of those citizens it deemed to be “criminals” in the late 1700’s. Many of those purported crimes were trivial, and many of those criminals were innocent women and even children. As with many events in human history, the stories are filtered through a male lens, the female experience either sanitized or completely omitted. This novel is told through the eyes of three female protagonists: A seventeen year old girl driven out of her home onto the streets of a cruel and indifferent London, a prostitute determined to build a better life in the new world, and a young aborigonal girl whose curiosity and bravery creates a bridge between English and Aboriginal women. Although set in the late 1700’s, the themes addressed in my book mirror the struggles that continue today, including inequality, racism, and sexual exploitation. The Canaries begins in London in 1787, an epicenter of human suffering where filth, disease, and crime fill the streets. Widespread unemployment and hunger force the government to execute a drastic solution: The expulsion of the unwanted. Poor and uneducated, seventeen-year-old Cora Barton is convicted of a crime she did not commit. Like many others -- including the young man she loves -- she is banished half-way around the world to Australia. While attempting to establish a new colony, the convicts, together with the free English, struggle against the ever-present threats of starvation, disease, and violence. Strangers in a foreign and unforgiving land, they encounter native Aborigonal people as the fight for resources and sovereignty begins. Mary, a prostitute from London, aligns herself with an English officer, carrying his child. As tensions rise between the English and the Aboriginals, Myree, a young girl, encounters Mary and a friendship between the two evolves. Meanwhile, Cora, separated from all she knows and the man she loves, must use her wits and the aid of an unlikely companion to gain freedom and a life of her own. 2. Sketch of antagonist or antagonistic forces The primary antagonist is England. The English people and her government determined the fate of these three females, either by calculated intension or cold indifference. For the desperate women who find themselves sentenced to deportation, England has deemed them so unworthy of care or consideration that she sends them across the globe, regardless of the suffering which will most certainly occur. The young aboriginal girl will also feel the weight of English influence and power, her life destroyed by the invasion of this new enemy. 3. Title options My working title has been “The Canaries”. This was a derogatory term referring to the Australian convicts as historically they were clothed in yellow and black. The Great Deportation 4. Comparable novels in terms of genre and common themes Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden 5. Logline Convicted of a crime, seventeen year old Cora is sentenced to deportation from England. Boarded onto a ship full of mostly male convicts she is headed for a strange new land, now called Australia. She must overcome not only the cruel months at sea but also find a way to establish a new life in a harsh and unforgiving land. 6. Inner conflict Cora, forced from her home, is filled with fear and feelings of unworthiness. She sacrificed her own security for the love of her sister and her sister’s unborn child. This act thrust her into a world where she is at the mercy of society. She has no power, no money, no protection-the streets of London immediately determine that she is prey to be consumed. Her inner conflict of fear and lacking is amplified as she is sentenced to transportation across the world. Both in the gaols of London and on the ship to Australia, her dignity is assaulted daily, not only due to her status as a criminal but also as a victim of a violent assault. Her inner battle with fear and unworthiness continues as she is separated from the man she loves, but whom she cannot believe could love her in return. Despite the inner struggle she escapes from her indentured servitude to grasp at her one chance for independence and a life of her own. 7. Setting 1700’s London is a dirty urban center filled with the smells of chimney smoke and excrement. Soot covers everything from the walls of the buildings to the clothing of the poor who spend most of their time on the streets. Chamber pots are emptied from apartment windows directly onto the streets below. Horses also use the cobblestone as their personal lavatory. Soap and clean water for a daily bath are too great a luxury for the general population. Body odors are strong and with increasingly densely populated common areas, the stench permeates all enclosed spaces. The ships, only recently made seaworthy, have served as floating prisons for their inhabitants. Held below deck, little light penetrates the small portholes. Each partition of space has been haphazardly constructed by inexperienced convict labor. Wooden walls hastily erected to contain groups of 10 or so prisoners. Pallets of hay are used for bedding, vermin and bugs are abundant. A community chamber pot is routinely emptied out of the small windows, inevitably producing overflow of human excrement that drips along both the inside and outside of the window walls. Botany Bay Australia is ruggedly beautiful and unforgivingly harsh. Nothing seems familiar to the English, convict or free. Flora and fauna are a mystery needing to be solved and quickly. The English also learn they are not alone in this daunting new place. Aboriginal tribes will defend their homes with all means necessary. Lives are in constant peril as the race to adequately feed, house, and protect hundreds of people has begun.