The Blue

Arapawa Island, in New Zealand's Tory Channel, 1938. For three months each year the men of the small community chase migrating whales in fast boats with explosive harpoons, while the women keep the houses going. Lilian lives there with her husband Ed, who came back from the First World War altered and withdrawn, and their younger son Billy; beneath her round of chores and chickens lies a private sorrow. This season her troubled son Micky returns as well. Around her the novel draws Ed's cousin Owen and his Annie, the Italian whaler Gunner and the boat crews, and the old story of how, in the war, Owen read out the letters Lilian sent to Ed. At its heart is the question of how to live with one's mistakes.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form

Novel

Length

282 pages in the original

Genres

Historical, Family (assigned by AI)

Set in

New Zealand, 1938

First published

2007 by Penguin Books

Author's age

46 when first published

ISBN

9780143007234 (Penguin Books, New Zealand)