Book Synopsis:
A powerful debut exploring the dark side of Cornwall – the wrecking and the drowned sailors – where poverty drove villagers to dark deeds…
Shipwrecks are part of life in the remote village of Porthmorvoren, Cornwall. And as the sea washes the bodies of the drowned onto the beach, it also brings treasures: barrels of liquor, exotic fruit, the chance to lift a fine pair of boots from a corpse, maybe even a jewel or two.
When, after a fierce storm, Mary Blight rescues a man half-dead from the sea, she ignores the whispers of her neighbours and carries him home to nurse better. Gideon Stone is a Methodist minister from Newlyn, a married man. Touched by Mary’s sacrifice and horrified by the superstitions and pagan beliefs the villagers cling to, Gideon sets out to bring light and salvation to Porthmorvoren by building a chapel on the hill.
But the village has many secrets and not everyone wants to be saved. As Mary and Gideon find themselves increasingly drawn together, jealousy, rumour and suspicion is rife. Gideon has demons of his own to face, and soon Mary’s enemies are plotting against her…
Wrecker is available now in ebook and hardbackback, you can purchase a copy of both here.
My Review:
Wrecker is a fantastic, atmospheric and quite dark piece of historical fiction that I really enjoyed.
The author is very good at setting the scene and I really felt transported to the Cornwall of the past. Cornwall’s myths and legends as well as the local dialogue is cleverly interwoven into the story which further helped evoke 18th Century Cornwall for me. The author has clearly done his research and I found it fascinating to learn more about the history behind the book.
Wrecking was quite an emotional practice to read about, especially when the shipwreck caused death. The people who did it or who stole from the dead must have been desperate to do it as I don’t think it’s something I could have done. The descriptions of what Mary sees when she visits the ship wrecks makes for quite hard reading at times, especially when it involved children .I did find myself skipping the passages that described those scenes.
I wasn’t entirely sure if I liked the main character Mary. On one hand I liked her don’t care attitude towards a lot of things and felt sorry for her for having to visit the ship wrecks in order to provide for her family. However she comes across as quite bitter about her position in life and vain as she cares a lot about her looks which meant I wasn’t able to warm to her. I found myself thinking she’d be a lot happier if she just accepted her position and her looks as a lot of people seem to like her.
For a historical fiction novel this was surprisingly fast paced with lots of stuff happening that helped keep my interest. The story is quite unusual and I wanted to keep reading to learn more about the history of place and to find out how it would end. I’m always slightly dubious when a novel is described as being like Daphne Du Maurier as she’s one of my favourite authors, but I did feel that it was justified this time as the styles are similar.
Huge thanks to Joe Thomas from HQ stories for my copy of this book via Netgalley and for inviting me onto the blog tour.
About The Author:
Noel O’Reilly is a writer and editor, now focusing on fiction. He studied English Literature at Goldsmiths, University of London, and formerly worked as an English teacher in London. He is an award-winning journalist and currently edits two magazines and contributes to a website for an international publisher.
A keen musician, he plays saxophone and guitar and has performed with various jazz and blues bands, including the Brighton Jazz Cooperative. He has written a musical and a number of comedy sketches and performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and venues including London’s Tram Shed, Boulevard Theatre in Soho and Melkweg in Amsterdam.
Noel spent a year living in Barcelona, commuting to his day job in London via EasyJet, and now lives in Brighton with his family.
Wrecker, Noel’s debut novel, is set in a remote fishing village in nineteenth century Cornwall which is steeped in pagan superstition. It explores the themes of religion and morality from a woman’s point of view and will be published by Harper Collins imprint HQ in summer 2018.
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