Terra Nova
It is 1910, and Edward Heywoud and James Webb are attempting to reach the South Pole while Viola, who is wife to Edward and lover of James, remains in London. She is seeking a way to prove herself and be independent of masculine control and expectations. While the two men struggle through great hardship towards their goal and in the hope of beating the Norwegians, Viola embarks on an artistic project that will draw attention to the effects of assault, starvation, and forced feeding on the bodies of suffragettes imprisoned for their demands for equality. She fully intends to shock.
Skills with photography lie at the heart of this story, and images are not always what they appear to be. Although facing rejection by the very women she seeks to support in her exhibition, Viola finds a way of inserting herself into their cause but must deal with unwelcome consequences. A single photograph of the men’s moment of triumph at the Pole will come to plague their increasingly fractured relationship, and when they return home, how they will behave in public and relate to Viola.
Clearly this is a “what-if” or alternative history as it relates to real Antarctica exploration. It contains echoes of the personal lives of Robert Falcon Scott and his artistic wife, Kathleen. As a result, the characters can seem derivative and elusive. Viola is intriguing, a woman who seeks to live on her own terms yet benefits from being the wife of a hero. The novel’s high points are the spectacular descriptions of endurance in the icy wastes and how it makes the reader reflect on the differences between female and male heroism, the risks one might take in the pursuit of fame or love, and whether it is ever possible to live with dishonor and lies.
