Australia Sweepstakes - Page 1

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Enter the Goodreads giveaway for The Famine Orphans by Patricia Falvey, a sweeping historical novel set in 1848. Across Ireland, 4,000 girls, most of them orphans, are selected from overcrowded workhouses and sent to Australia under the Earl Grey Scheme. Officially, they’re promised work as domestic servants. Unofficially, they’re expected to help “civilize” the male convict population and lay the foundations of new settlements.
Among them is Kate Gilvarry, who’s endured six bleak months in a Newry workhouse, surviving on little more than watery porridge. With no future in famine-stricken Ireland, she boards a ship bound for the unknown. But the journey is only the beginning. In Sydney, Kate and her fellow passengers face hostility and rising anti-Irish prejudice. Struggling with homesickness and heartbreak after a fleeting romance at sea, Kate must navigate a harsh new world, first as a servant to a demanding Englishwoman, then as a bride on the unforgiving frontier.