Staircase to the Moon

This book was provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book was sweetly amazing. This was an unknown author to me, but some of my favorite authors are Aussies and I love historical romances, so I was excited to give this one a try. This was my first historical fiction book based in Australia, and I found myself researching the country, station life around WWI, and learning much about immigrants in Australia during that time frame.

With three major settings, Emily's story begins in Perth in 1913, one year before the start of WWI. She lives as a young single woman with her father and three excessively over-protective brothers, working together in the family Tailor Business. They plan out every step she takes in life, from the clothes she wears, who she is friends with, and who she will marry. Far beyond the time of arranged marriages, they try to marry her to an abhorrent man of wealth, thinking only of the family connection it will give them and that their sister will be provided for. Unable to breathe with the strict confinements her brothers have imposed on her (thinking they are helping and loving her), she secretly arranges to travel far up the coast to Kimberly, accepting a temporary position on a station (an enormous cattle ranch), as a seamstress to a wealthy station family. And this is where Emily's road to independence and adventure begins.

There are so many colorful supporting characters in the story that make it fun and draw you into the adventure. Her own character begins to change on the sea-voyage from Perth to Kimberly. From her "Auntie" Freddie, to Annie, the traveling wealthy wife to a Director, to the boat Captain Tom and his trouser wearing wife, Pat, to the argumentative Chinese Cook, Hop Sing, Emily learned to see herself as beautiful, courageous, resourceful, and worthy of deep friendships and eventually love. Her confidence and strength begin to grow on the journey north.

Arriving in Kimberly, dirty, exhausted, and with a mutual animosity for the Cook, Hop Sing, she is delivered by wagon to the palatial home of Kitty, the housewife of a wealthy Station owner. Kitty immediately welcomes her into her family. This is the first time Emily has lived with a mother figure or "sisters", but even more profound, the first time she has met a young man as handsome and kind as Liam, Kitty's only son.

Emily's time on the Station begins sweetly, with her fulfilling her obligation of creating a new fashionable wardrobe for the family, becoming friends with the sisters and the unfortunately engaged, Liam, and receiving the attentions of the family's Station Manager. Life had never been so glorious! And then Britain, and indirectly Australia, joins the war against Germany.

With the men naively enthusiastic to leave for battle, the tasks of running the Stations is left to the Women and the Aborigine Station Hands. Emily's resourcefulness, loyalty to her new adopted family, and courage are an example to the gently bred ladies of Kimberly, as they manage the property through trial after trial. There are heart-wrenching moments of great loss throughout their year on their own, and if their husbands, sons, and friends ever make it back from war, they will find their women and homes forever altered.

I sobbed through parts of the story, I laughed through most of the conflict between Hop Sing and Emily, and I enjoyed war fuzzies as Emily found love. I was entranced by the imagery, relationships, and history of Haran's book, and though a long one, I couldn't stop reading until the end. And what a sweet ending! This is now one of my favorite books and Haran keeps me loving those Aussie Authors.