Stairway to the Moon (Colin Falconer, Bantam, $32.95 tpb, ISBN 9781863255714, December) ***

Stairway to the Moon is the second in what feels like a continuing series that began with Falconer’s 2006 novel Pearls—although the publicity blurb says ‘brings to a stunning conclusion….’ That said, you don’t need to have read the first to appreciate the epic historical story and character arcs as established in Pearls and re-set here during the period 1934-1942. Again set in Broome, Western Australia, Falconer’s book continues to plot the plight of the once booming pearl town, this time as the good times wane and war approaches. Stairway to the Moon is essentially a ‘wrong-side of the tracks’ love story between Jamie Niland and Elvie Mc Kenzie. He is the well-educatedson from an established family and she the wild child of a hard working but flawed pearl diver. This
is the third book in a row I have read that is set in Western Australia and I appreciate that the vastness and isolation of the landscape lends itself perfectly to the romantic historical epic—but I must admit I found this novel a little light on and a little cliched in its character development. It lacks the excellent descriptive prose of, say, Judy Nunn and suffers a little in comparison. However I am quite sure that this will do well in the mass market for Christmas, especially given the popularity of Pearls.

Rachel Wilson is an academic and works at the Sun Bookshop Yarraville, Melbourne

This review from Australian Bookseller & Publisher magazine is reproduced by kind permission of Thorpe-Bowker, a division of R R Bowker LLC. © Copyright 2007, Thorpe-Bowker