Devotion by Hannah Kent follows the teenage Hanne on a treacherous journey by sea to Australia in the 1830s. Her Old Lutheran community in Prussia have been exiled for being too extremist compared to the mainstream Protestant Church. And so they set sail for South Australia, where they are to build a new settlement. A new settlement that is a replica of their old home in Prussia, but this time built on the land of the Peramangk people. It is interesting how those persecuted in their own country can become colonisers in another.
Hanne’s faith is sincere, and yet she struggles to find the language and to reconcile this with her growing love for Thea. Hanne has never managed to get along with the other girls in her community. She is more at home in nature than in the conservative domestic duties expected of her. But with Thea it is different. They become inseparable. The prose in this novel is glorious. The descriptions of nature and love are heart-achingly beautiful.
But don’t mistake this for being merely a straightforward forbidden love story set against the constraints of an old-fashioned society. Devotion may be those things, but it also has quite the twist. Just when you think you’re reading something predictable, the author shakes it up completely. Devotion is a really fun read, and, like with all Hannah Kent’s books, I finished it feeling like I’d learnt about a place and a time that I’d previously known absolutely nothing about. It’s time to add Devotion by Hannah Kent to your TBR pile!
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