Homecoming
By Kate Morton | Moderated by Celinés | Historical Fiction | Mystery
About the Book
Adelaide Hills, Christmas Eve, 1959: At the end of a scorching hot day, beside a creek in the grounds of a grand country house, a local man makes a terrible discovery. Police are called, and the small town of Tambilla becomes embroiled in one of the most baffling murder investigations in the history of South Australia.
Many years later and thousands of miles away, Jess is a journalist in search of a story. Having lived and worked in London for nearly two decades, she now finds herself unemployed and struggling to make ends meet. A phone call summons her back to Sydney, where her beloved grandmother, Nora, who raised Jess when her mother could not, has suffered a fall and is seriously ill in hospital.
At Nora’s house, Jess discovers a true crime book chronicling a long-buried police case: the Turner Family Tragedy of 1959. It is only when Jess skims through its pages that she finds a shocking connection between her own family and this notorious event — a mystery that has never been satisfactorily resolved.
An epic story that spans continents and generations, Homecoming asks what we would do for those we love, how we protect the lies we tell, and what it means to come home. Above all, it is an intricate and spellbinding novel from one of the finest writers working today.
About the author
Is an Australian author. Morton has sold more than 16 million books in 42 countries, making her one of Australia’s “biggest publishing exports”. The author has written six novels: The House at Riverton (The Shifting Fog), The Forgotten Garden, The Distant Hours, The Secret Keeper, The Lake House, and The Clockmaker’s Daughter (published in September 2018). Her seventh book, Homecoming, published in April 2023.
Kate Morton was born in South Australia, grew up in the mountains of south-east Queensland, and now lives with her family in London and Australia. She has degrees in dramatic art and English literature, and harboured dreams of joining the Royal Shakespeare Company until she realised that it was words she loved more than performing. Kate still feels a pang of longing each time she goes to the theatre and the house lights dim.
“I fell deeply in love with books as a child and believe that reading is freedom; that to read is to live a thousand lives in one; that fiction is a magical conversation between two people – you and me – in which our minds meet across time and space. I love books that conjure a world around me, bringing their characters and settings to life, so that the real world disappears and all that matters, from beginning to end, is turning one more page.”
Flora & Fauna of the book
Koohaburra
The blue-winged kookaburra is a large species of kingfisher native to northern Australia and southern New Guinea.
Currawong
The black currawong (Strepera fuliginosa ), also known locally as the black jay, is a large passerine bird endemic to Tasmania and the nearby islands within the Bass Strait. One of three currawong species in the genus Strepera, it is closely related to the butcherbirds and Australian magpie within the family Artamidae.
Red wattlebird
Is a passerine bird native to southern Australia. At 33–37 cm (13–14+1⁄2 in) in length, it is the second largest species of Australian honeyeater.
Carved Wren
The gift Percy had for his wife when he discover the bodies of The Turners. He lost it on the grounds of Halcyon.
Koohaburra
is a bird in the honeyeater family, Meliphagidae, and is endemic to eastern and southeastern Australia. This miner is a grey bird, with a black head, orange-yellow beak and feet, a distinctive yellow patch behind the eye, and white tips on the tail feathers.
Wren
The superb fairywren is a passerine bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae, and is common and familiar across south-eastern Australia.
Australian Magpie
Iis a black and white passerine bird native to Australia, New Zealand and southern New Guinea.. Described as one of Australia's most accomplished songbirds, the Australian magpie has an array of complex vocalisations.
Acacia pycnantha, most commonly known as the golden wattle, is a tree of the family Fabaceae native to southeastern Australia. It grows to a height of 8 m and has phyllodes instead of true leaves.
“Mrs. Turner opened her journal to a fresh page and recorded the date in her precise hand, was the same as ever: directly ahead, on the other side of the driveway, the summertime foliage of the enormous oak was so dense that she could barely see the children’s tree house in the middle of the branches.”
Image is reference of oak tree with tree house.
Wallnut Tree
The bunyip is a creature from the aboriginal mythology of southeastern Australia, said to lurk in swamps, billabongs, creeks, riverbeds, and waterholes.
Bunyip. According to legend, a man-eating monster once lived in the rivers, lakes and swamps of Australia. Its howl carried through the night air, making people afraid to enter the water. At night, the bunyip prowled the land, hunting for women and children to eat.
In Australia, the strangeness came from the land itself. Its mystery and meaning existed outside her own language, at any rate. Her children had brought home a tale once, from wherever children learnes the things the knew, about a bunyip. "A WHAT? "she'd asked. "A bunyip", they'd said appraising her with wide, direct gazes that implied of course. Mrs. Turner found it a somewhat unsettling proposition to raise children in a land other than the one which she'd been a child herself. Their point of reference were different from her own and they sometimes felt quite foreign.
Hacyon, could be both a noun and an adjective, the former describing a type of kingfisher bird, the latter meaning “calm, peaceful; happy, prosperous, idyllic.” But neither suggested itself as particularly burdensome.
The Turnes had called the house “Halcyon” in an attempt to “make it their own”. The name had been Mr. Turner’s ideas, an one to which he’d become very attached. Indeed, he had already placed his order with Galloway Bros. Signwriters in Double Bay when he presented the name to his wife for her consideration. She had agreed without debate – as with the number of tiers on the wedding cake, she cared little what they called the house. The suggestion had seemed romantic, very much in keeping with his nature; it was his nature, after all, that had attracted her in the first place, shining as it had, like a rare and precious gem, in the grime of wartime London.
Family Tree
Based on what we've read so far.
Taste it, Jummy drinks for the meetings.
6 Ingredients
Mango Martini
- 55g (1/4 cup) caster sugar.
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300g frozen chopped mango
-
100ml vodka
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60ml (1/4 cup) fresh orange juice
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Fresh mint leaves, to decorate
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Dehydrated orange slices, to decorate (optional, see tip)
6 Ingredients
Black Cat Martini
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Black Cats lollies, to serve
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90ml chocolate liqueur
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60ml (1/4 cup) vanilla liqueur
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30ml Baileys Original Irish Cream Liqueur
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Black Cat vodka
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170g pkt Black Cats lollies
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500ml (2 cups) vodka
5 Ingredients
Piña Colada Slushie
-
55g (1/4 cup) caster sugar
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300g frozen chopped pineapple
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100ml Malibu
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60ml (1/4 cup) coconut water
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Coconut flakes and pineapple leaves, to decorate
8 Ingredients
Lemon Drop Spritz
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60ml (1/4 cup) vodka
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60ml (1/4 cup) triple sec
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80ml (1/3 cup) fresh lemon juice, plus extra, to serve
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60ml (1/4 cup) sugar syrup (see note)
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Ice cubes, to serve
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Lemon jelly crystals, to decorate
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Sea salt flakes, to decorate
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160ml (2/3 cup) chilled mineral water
Book Trail
Buy the book:
Book Club Questions for meetings:
- Qué les ha parecido el libro hasta ahora?
- Qué les han parecido los personajes de Jess, Nora e Isabel?
- El libro que va a escribir Jess, de qué creen que se va a tratar?
- Por qué creen que Polly dejó a Jess con Nora?
- Creen que fue difícil para Nora dejar que Jess se mudara a Londres?
- En el caso de Jess que vive en Londres lejos de su familia y que le escondía las situaciones por las que estaba pasando. ¿Ustedes creen que es correcto esconderle las situaciones difíciles a su familia? Les ha pasado?
- Quién le mandó la carta a Nora desde el sur de Australia?
- Qué les parece el comportamiento de Thomas Turner? Dejar a la familia sola para viajar por el mundo.
- Por qué creen que Isabel no pidió ayuda cuando se sentía sola y deprimida?
- Creen que el suicidio de la madre de Isabel tuvo un impacto en la decisión de Isabel de envenarse ella y a sus hijos?
- Cuál es punto que más les ha impactado del libro hasta ahora?
- Teorías para la segunda mitad...
One Comment
Julie Belliard
Great choice! Excited for the books and the martinis! 📚📖🍸