A Wild and Heavenly Place
“Remember! Washington Territory.” These words echo throughout Robin Oliveira’s new wide-ranging, romantic historical novel. They link a pair of star-crossed lovers all the way from Glasgow to Seattle, and they also beautifully sum up the story itself.
It’s a Romeo and Juliet story set between 1878 and 1882, first in grim industrial Glasgow and then in raw, raucous, but breathtakingly lovely Washington Territory. In Glasgow, teenagers Hailey MacIntyre and Samuel Fiddes fall in love at first sight, but many obstacles come between them: social class, education, disapproving parents, distance, and finally, and most dangerously, a hateful rival. But true love cannot, and will not, be denied.
Another linking theme is coal. Sooty, flammable, valuable—its traces blacken both Hailey’s elite part of Glasgow and the wretched tenement where Samuel lives. Coal mines and coal-powered steam engines often figure in the plot. Coal is money and coal is also death.
Inspired by her plea to him, “Remember! Washington Territory,” where she is going, Samuel follows Hailey to a very well-researched and well-evoked Wild Western Washington Territory, muddy and primitive, but a haven for immigrants and a rich source of coal.
Plot twists enliven the text. There are several lifesaving rescues. The MacIntyres lose their money, while Samuel rises in the world, becoming a shipbuilder. The passages describing ships and shipbuilding are some of the best in the book, along with vivid descriptions of western Washington’s climate and coastal scenery, where the author makes her home. The reader will remember Washington Territory too.
The phrase “a wild and heavenly place” also carries special meaning. It stands, as Oliveira tells us, for the ecstasy one feels when home and love coincide, an emotional state which Hailey and Samuel finally achieve.
