Ravenglass
The Ravenglass family live in Whitehaven, Cumberland, where the father is a shipowner. Resolve transports ivory and slaves from The Gambia and Guinea to Barbados, bringing molasses back home: a despicable but lucrative trade.
Mystery surrounds the mother. There are two children, Fliss and her brother Kit, who knows from a very young age that he should be a girl. He is ridiculed at school, and at Lammas Fair he is forced into a plan to abuse a girl. They choose his cousin, Hannah Salkeld. Kit cannot bring himself to help her, and she is rescued by his father.
The boys, including Kit, are sent to sea, but his naval career is calamitous, and he returns to work in his father’s business. The family slides into disaster. Kit escapes to live as ‘Stella’ with her Black friend Joshy, who abandons her in Newcastle. She makes her way to Edinburgh where for two years she works as a seamstress. But with the coming of the Jacobite Rebellion, Stella and Kit must decide who they really are.
This is quite a long novel, and there is much more to tell. It is not ‘preachy’ in its handling of the central character’s sexuality nor in describing the horrors of the slave trade, but it does not shy away from either. The research has been thorough, whether into ladies’ fashions or life aboard ship. But its great strength is its characterisation, particularly of Kit and his family. The descriptions of the towns and of the surrounding countryside and scenery evoke a sense of place and time.
It will appeal to anyone interested in 18th-century history, the slave trade and the fitting out of the ships, the Jacobite Rebellion, attitudes towards sexuality or anyone enjoying an adventure story. I would recommend it highly.
