Lynne Cairns

Where Wild Black Swans are Flying Lynne Cairns

'Where the Wild Black Swans are Flying' is an historical novel set in Western Australia's Swan River Colony in the in the first years of white settlement. Becky Lees arrived in the new colony as a baby. She is the child of indentured servants, bound to work for seven years for their master. Conditions in the colony had improved by the time she was seven, but her mother was still cooking on an open fire in a bush shed, with tragic results.

When her father also dies in a bullock-wagon accident far from white settlements, Becky is rescued by indigenous Noongar people and travels with them for some months, before being taken in by Meg Kenyon, a widow struggling to be self-sufficient on a remote farm, where they live on fish, and the vegetables and fruit they grow. The hardships she and Meg face, and overcome, reflect realities overlooked in novels about the colonial gentry. Fate has more trauma in store for Becky but, against the odds, she finally finds happiness.