Green Velvet Shoes

Paperback historical saga. 683 pages
Cost: AUD$49.95 incl GST and post within Australia.

Economy Edition also available. Click here for details.

Green Velvet Shoes

Synopsis of Green Velvet Shoes

The Flying Fish is about to embark from England to Australia under the captaincy of Langford Ennis. The passengers and their entire belongings have been loaded and (the too young) Jos Todhunter is excited about his future and the Queensland land voucher he has in his oilskin.

The boat does not make it to Australia; it crashes onto New Zealand’s icy south island. Most passengers resign themselves to having to stay and make do in the town or environs of Kneejoint. Not so dyslectic and resourceful Jos Todhunter. He leaves for Queensland and returns some years later, having worked the goldfields and collected a decent income as well as pioneering know how.

The Todhunter family grows in unexpected ways, as does their family estate. Green Velvet Shoes covers three generations of Todhunters, their successes, failures, genetic inheritance and vices. Melody Todhunter, Jos’s granddaughter, finds her mother’s diaries hidden under a house in a Brisbane rental property. Details about their lives, parties, affairs, murders and educational mishaps are exposed as she reads. The appalling treatment of her mother’s dyslectic siblings at school and the consequences of male domination and punishment make Melody resolved to fight to become rightful heir of the Todhunter fortune.

Green Velvet Shoes is a fictionalised account of settlement; it brings us a readable, but thoroughly researched history about the Antipodes at the time of the pioneers, especially the plight of women and those with learning difficulties over successive generations. The chronicle is rich in social commentary, day to day detail and does not shirk from the horrors and disappointments experienced by newcomers to this land.