The Curious Tale of the Lady Caraboo

"This book plunges you into a technicolour world that you can believe right away. The opening of this book is brutal. A young woman, Mary Wilcox, travelling alone, is viciously attacked. We understand that she has had a child out of wedlock and that she was going home hoping to be taken back into her family. But as we all know that the chances of her family accepting her back are very slim indeed. Her prospects look grim. Then there is the wealthy Cassandra Worrell – who has taken a tumble from her horse and by chance ends up at the local inn. Here at the inn Cassandra meets a strange young woman, dark skinned and speaking a language that no-one understands. This mysterious woman is in fact Mary who has adopted this new identity as a survival tactic – it is done in desperation. She convinces everyone around her that she is a Javanese princess who has lost her way. This chance meeting with the wealthy Cassandra marks a turning point for Mary. She is taken in by Cassandra’s family who really believe that she is this exotic princess. Well, the mother is totally convinced but there are other members of the family who aren’t so convinced – especially the apparently morally weak brother Fred. There are parallel stories that fill the book with intrigue and the book is told from a range of perspectives. Yes, she hides her true self behind this fake personality and fake language. She is living a lie. At some point the family are taken in by Captain Palmer who is really a charlatan and a drunk. He convinces the family that he can understand the Caraboo language – he spotted the deception and is trying to take advantage in order to swindle the family and Mary herself. So, we have a situation where Mary knows he is lying and he knows Mary is lying and so Mary is helplessly drawn into a deeper and more criminal deception. It is and it was all over the papers. So much was said about this woman and this book gives a voice to this woman. I love that we hear her side of the story in this book. I love what Catherine Johnson does with the characters. It is brilliant historical fiction in this sense. Nor is anything quite as it first seems. You are forced to challenge your expectations of these characters – ask question of your assumptions. In young adult fiction something I’ve noticed and that I really enjoy is that the characters are more often than not changed by the events they experience. I feel very much that the characters in this book have been transformed by the end. I think it is important that the characters of a story are changed by events in their lives."