Australia beckons as a land of opportunity, though the hamlet of Sydney is at this time (1806) little more than a cluster of crude huts. Sentenced to death for theft (he stole a load of wood), he receives a commutation of his sentence thanks to the emotional importunings of his devoted wife Sal, and when he is “transported” to New South Wales as a convict laborer, William’s family dutifully accompanies him.
It’s the story of William Thornhill, a London bargeman who turns to petty crime after an impoverished childhood and when marriage and paternity severely test his survival skills. In a follow-up to her Orange Prize–winning The Idea of Perfection (2002), Grenville reaches back to Australia’s origins, in an expansive tale similar in plot and theme to Patrick White’s 1976 masterpiece, A Fringe of Leaves. Thornhill visits him occasionally after the massacre, but never sees the woman or Blackwood's child again.A riveting narrative unfolds into a chilling allegory of the mechanics and the psychology of colonialism in the veteran Australian author’s rich historical novel. After the massacre, Thornhill’s second oldest son, Dick, goes to live with Blackwood and ferry rum up the river for him. He avoids them whenever possible and eventually attacks Smasher for speaking violently about the natives. Blackwood despises men like Smasher and Sagitty, who deal violently and cruelly with the natives. Thornhill also learns that Blackwood has an Aboriginal lover and the two have a child, and that Blackwood has learned the native language to communicate with them.
Thornhill learns the extent of this when he goes to speak to Blackwood about the natives living on his own property and discovers that Blackwood lives on the very edge of his lagoon and doesn't venture into the forest because the natives told him to stay by the river. He tells Thornhill that when dealing with the Aborigines, he has to remember that nothing is free: if a person takes something, they must be willing to give a little in return.
Blackwood is a quiet and private man who speaks in riddles when he speaks at all. Thornhill runs into him later in New South Wales, where Blackwood is not only making his fortune honestly, he has also received a full pardon and owns land on the Hawkesbury River where he makes rum. When Thornhill first meets Thomas Blackwood in London, he owns a lighter called the River Queen, which has a false bottom for stealing cargo.
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