This one was a miss for me, after a really strong start and completely falling in love for the prose and narrative style, I found my interest waning into the voyage part of the narrative.

I read this book at the beginning of the year and had hoped to write a detailed review.... but where to begin?! This is Kent at her best. Her descriptions of the landscape are breathtaking. This is her strength as a writer and I reckon she's at the top of the game in Devotion (I'm always struck by descriptions of water/ ocean and here she is just so, so skilled).

And the twist... so clever, so unexpected, so heart-breakingly beautiful

Such beautiful writing in this historical novel in the 1830s about Lutheran immigrants to South Australia. It’s about Hanne, a teenager and her love for another girl, Thea, essentially it’s about undying love (which for me was a bit overdone). I really loved the historical detail that Kent adds to this framework, the hardworking families, the sea voyage to Australia, the descriptions of nature both in Europe and the new country, it’s incredibly well written. The second half of the book ventures into magical realism which I quite enjoyed but I think I would’ve perhaps loved even more a straight historical novel written from the point of view of one of the older women characters like Thea’s mother, Anna Maria.

Queer historical fiction about Prussian immigrants to South Australia

I received a copy of this eBook courtesy of the publisher.

“Devotion” by Hannah Kent is a historical fiction novel set initially in Prussia in 1836. Hanne, her twin brother and her parents live in an Old Lutheran community. Hanne has always struggled to fit in with the other teenaged girls and the expectations of her mother, and prefers instead to spend time in nature. However when Hanne meets Thea, the daughter of a new family who joined the community, her whole world changes and suddenly she doesn’t feel so alone. When the community flees religious persecution for the colony of South Australia, Hanne and Thea’s bond is put to the ultimate test.

Kent is a beautiful writer and this book shows off her prowess bringing the diverse and untold stories of women in history to life. I found this to be a really relatable story, and Kent expertly captured the mutual love and frustration of mother-daughter relationships and how faith is interwoven in the community’s daily life. The connection between Hanne and Thea was both gentle and electric, and watching their friendship and relationship bloom was the highlight of the book. There were some elements of magic realism and spirituality that were interesting as well, with Hanne’s affinity for listening to nature underpinning and enriching a lot of the events that unfold.

It is a little hard to review this book because something incredibly significant and life-changing happens in the middle of the book which I can’t really mention without spoiling the story. Suffice to say that while it was creatively courageous, I’m not sure it added to the overall plot and I think I might have preferred it if Kent had taken another direction.

A unique story with plenty of depth, plenty of emotion and plenty of heart.

True to Hannah Kent's style, the writing in Devotion is beautiful. . Essentially a love story between Hanne and Thea, we learn of the persecution of the Old Lutherans and their perilous journey from Germany to South Australia. The detail of life on the ship is fascinating.. Whilst there is love and sorrow, their is much joy and the writing lifts the story at all times. Another wonderful book by Kent that lifts your heart.

“I want to wear black too. I want to take a moonless night and make a shroud of it. I want to wrap it about my head and cry into that night of no moon. I will take the black of a well and dress myself in its dark, hidden water until it fills my mouth and drowns me, and I may be where she is”
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Hanne is a child of nature. She can hear the snow chime as it falls and the trees sing as the sap rises. A coltish fifteen year old, she does not fit easily into the Old Lutheran community of her small Prussian village, so when the Eichenwalds arrive with their daughter Thea, it’s the first time that Hanne has experienced true friendship and the first stirrings of love

Set in 1836 the old Lutheran religion has been outlawed and Hanne’s village is desperate to emigrate overseas to a land that allows them religious freedom. When permission is finally given, a convoy of families sets off for the New World. The sea journey alone takes six months which Hanne and Thea, berthed together in the bow of the ship with the other unmarried girls, welcome as an opportunity to grow closer. However, six months of living in cramped, unsanitary conditions with limited fresh water leads to an outbreak of Typhus

Whilst the first half of the book deals with life in Prussia and the community’s long sea voyage, the second focuses on their arrival in South Australia. Without spoilers, something happens that flips the narrative on its head and the second half is very different to the first. It is no less beautifully written and what shines through is love in all of its guises and the incredible human ability to love and have faith no matter how they are tested or what losses befall them. A quote from Emily Dickinson kept running through my mind reading Devotion which was very strange because when I opened my next book, The Book of Magic by Alice Hoffman, there is was in black and white on the page

“Unable are the loved to die, for love is immortality”

If you loved Burial Rites or Hamnet, I urge you to read this one. I know we’re only a short way into the year, but I have a sense that this will remain in my tops reads for 2022

Devotion by Hannah Kent. Book 122 of the year and it has left me with hugely mixed feelings. I absolutely loved the first half and really thought it was going to become one of my all time favourite books. It’s historical but also literary fiction and the writing and storyline just had me 100% in. Such incredible use of language.
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But, and it’s hard to say much without giving things away, so I will be obscure… something occurs and the second half is very different and I just could not get on board with the change. Don’t get me wrong - it is still beautifully written and I was still hooked until the end, but I just would have preferred an entirely different second half.
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The story of Hanne and Thea - two young girls of Lutheran faith whose whole community has been banned from practicing their religion, they must leave their country and home, and cross the world to start a new life in Australia. Definitely worth reading!

Equal parts beautiful and devastating, Hannah Kent's Devotion is a story that will haunt me for a long, long time.

Hanne is… strange. She can hear songs from the earth and the trees. In her small Lutheran community, she is a loner – none of the other young people, especially the other girls, want to be her friend.

Until Thea and her family move to the town. Suddenly, Hanne is seen and understood in a way she has never experienced before. In no time at all, Hanne and Thea are thick as thieves, completely devoted to one another; two halves of the same whole. Nothing and no one can tear them apart.

But there’s a dangerous journey ahead, not only for Hanne and Thea, but for their whole community, and nothing in their life is guaranteed.

I don’t want to go into too much more detail than that, because anything beyond is spoiler territory, but please know that Devotion is so much more than I expected. If you loved and were moved by The Song of Achilles, I think Devotion will be your next favourite.

Kent has crafted such a beautiful, poetic, and raw story about the power and vulnerability and magic of love, and it has truly struck me to my core. This book has ruined me. I think I cried for at least a full half an hour when I finished it. I keep finding my thoughts drifting to Hanne and Thea, and I know this book will be on my mind for a long while yet.

Thank you to NetGalley and to Pan Macmillan Australia for providing me with an ARC of this book.

Kent's writing is just so beautiful, so poetic that it doesn't really matter what the story is about for the reader can be secure that they are in safe hands.
Basically this is the story of German immigrants who settle in what is now known as Hahndorf in the Adelaide hills. Specifically it tells the story of two teenage girls, Hanne and Thea, who fall in love with each other, but because of the times, have no way of really expressing their love to each other. The journey out to Australia on the ship was the strongest section for me and the descriptions of life onboard was vivid, immersive and unforgettable. A beautiful book.

Devotion by Hannah Kent is a beautifully written historical fiction. It is a slow and intense read which borders on poetical; definitely in the category of literary historical fiction.

The publisher’s blurb is an excellent introduction:

1836, Prussia. Hanne is nearly fifteen and the domestic world of womanhood is quickly closing in on her. A child of nature, she yearns instead for the rush of the river, the wind dancing around her. Hanne finds little comfort in the local girls and friendship doesn't come easily, until she meets Thea and she finds in her a kindred spirit and finally, acceptance.

Hanne's family are Old Lutherans, and in her small village hushed worship is done secretly - this is a community under threat. But when they are granted safe passage to Australia, the community rejoices: at last a place they can pray without fear, a permanent home. Freedom.

It's a promise of freedom that will have devastating consequences for Hanne and Thea, but, on that long and brutal journey, their bond proves too strong for even nature to break . .

The character development is intense and so is the relationship between Hanne and her friend Thea as well as her family. The journey from the Prussian village of Kay to South Australia is long and arduous and vividly depicted by Hannah Kent. Incredibly well researched which is reflected in the meticulous detail that is incorporated into the story. A moving story that required patience. Not a novel to be devoured in one sitting.

Highly recommended if you enjoy literary historical fiction.

Thank you to Netgalley and publisher Pan Macmillan Australia for a copy to read and write an honest review.

After reading Kent's previous books BURIAL RITES and THE GOOD PEOPLE, I knew that she has a special skill in bringing the past to life with vivid imagery of her words. The story of Hanne and Thea, two young Lutheran girls embarking on a journey to the colonies of South Australia to start a new life, sounded interesting. Little did I realise though that it was not a straightforward, ordinary piece of historical fiction. Though inspired by the real life characters and the origins of the settlement that is now Hahndorf in the Adelaide Hills, Kent has a few surprises in store for her readers.

As Hanne and Thea's friendship blossoms into a forbidden romance, I was wondering about what the future would hold for these two young women, considering the ultra religious and conservative environment that entraps them. I could never have guessed the turn the story took at its half way mark, and I admit that I was a bit taken aback initially. However, Kent's lyrical prose lent the story an almost dreamlike quality that fitted in well with this "twist", for the lack of a better term without giving too much away. It also allowed for a broader perspective of the lives of the new community established in the colony, and a resolution that was unusual to say the least.

This turn of events probably won't be for everyone but I urge you to give it a chance, because the rest of the journey was worth it. I particularly enjoyed Kent's descriptions of nature and the slightly supernatural air that marked the later part of the book. Kent also doesn't shy away from exposing the darker side of European settlement and the treatment of the Peramangk people, the original custodians of the land. Overall, the story turned out to be less of a historical account, but an emotionally charged tale of love, longing and grief that rapidly got me under its spell. It was both beautiful and sad, with many topics to reflect on. DEVOTION is one of those books that will stick in my mind with its timeless quality and characters.

4★
“Why do men bother with churches at all when instead they might make cathedrals out of sky and water? Better a chorus of birds than a choir. Better an altar of leaves. Baptise me in rainfall and crown me with sunrise. If I am still, somehow, God’s child, let me find grace in the mysteries of bat-shriek and honeycomb.”

Hanne is a teenaged girl from a devout Lutheran family in 19th century Prussia. Her father is a fairly strict elder, her mother is beautiful and loving, but she’s undemonstrative – not a cuddly, hugging sort of mother. Hanne is tall and coltish, with long legs that occasionally stumble.

“Here she is, the cuckoo born to a songbird. The odd, unbeautiful daughter.”

Her twin brother, Matthias, is her closest friend and ally. They used to curl up together as babies and youngsters, but now that they’re in their teens, Matthias sleeps up in the loft, and Hanne is forbidden to join him, although she doesn’t really understand why. They have been a part of each other for so long, that she feels the loss badly.

She doesn’t seem to fret that she has no girlfriends because she has always had Matthias, but now she relies more than ever on the companionship of her beloved forest with all of its sounds and music. She hears the melody and hums and whispers of life everywhere. Her mother does understand this and sometimes sends her to pick mushrooms, knowing that it is a happy respite for Hanne from women’s work at home.

“I was forever nature’s child. It is probably best to say this now. I sought out solitude. Happiness was playing in the whir of grass at the uncultivated edges of our village, listening to the ticking of insects, or plunging my feet into fresh snow until my stockings grew wet and my toes numb.”

A new family moves to the village from a different area. The mother is a Wend, from a Slavic community, and rumour has it she is a ‘Hexe’, a witch. But the father is German, and they have moved to the village to escape religious persecution just as the Lutherans did, so Hanne’s family is prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Their daughter, Thea, is Hanne’s age, but Hanne isn’t interested in meeting more people. She prefers to be alone in the forest, listening to the magic there.

“Suddenly I heard stick-break, the cracking of wood, and someone appeared out of the fog.

She was an apparition walking between hazy columns of trees, her outline growing clearer as she walked. It seemed, for one small moment, that we were underwater. I saw her breath stream as she heaved a crooked weight of kindling; I saw her through the cloud of my own breath and held it, the better to see her.

She looked up and, seeing me watching her, stopped.

I exhaled.

The air hung with water. Held its own breath as we regarded one another.

The girl freed a hand from her bundle of sticks. I watched as she raised it, uncertain, then lifted my own palm.

‘I thought you were a ghost,’ she said. Her voice was low. Unsteady.

‘I thought you were too.’

‘You scared me.’ She hoisted the bundle of kindling onto her hip and approached me through the fog. ‘I’m Thea.’

I remembered myself. ‘Hanne.’

The mist between us thinned as she drew closer. Her face was round, smooth-cheeked, and I saw that her hair was white-blonde, her eyebrows fairer than her skin. It looked, not unpleasantly, as though she had been dusted with flour.

Against the silence of the forest, her footsteps upon the twigs and needles sounded impossibly loud.

‘You’re not, then?’ She continued walking until she was standing an arm’s length away. I could see that her eyelashes were translucent, surrounding eyes that were deeply blue. Fathomless blue, winter’s blue.

‘What?’ Water dripped from the tree above me and fell inside my collar. Trickled down my back.

She smiled. ‘A ghost.’

I noticed then that, while her front teeth were small and neat, those next to them stuck out at an angle. It gave her a hungry, slightly wolfish look.

‘No. I don’t think so. Unless I died in my sleep.’

‘Maybe both of us died in our sleep, and here we are, two ghosts. Telling each other we’re alive.’

I laughed. For a moment I wondered if there could be truth in what she said. The mist had thickened, and with her white hair it looked as though she might suddenly be absorbed into the cloud about us.”

I liked the quick rapport between the two young outsiders, and they do become great friends. Hanne begins spending a lot of time with Thea’s family and comes to understand Thea’s mother’s special skills as a midwife and herbalist.

When the villagers learn that they are no longer safe in this village, they arrange passage on a ship to create a new settlement in Australia. Hanne is stunned when they sail out of the rivers and into the vastness of the open sea.

“The good Lord knows, if I could live any moment of my life over again, it would be that one. Ribs divided, heart devouring the knife-edge of beauty. To see the ocean for the first time, every time. Her hand in mine.

Holy blade that guts us with awe.”

The six-month voyage is horrific. Quarters are cramped, much of the food has gone off, and the water has spoiled. By the time they arrive, their numbers have dwindled due to typhus and other diseases, with bodies buried at sea or onshore, if they were near land.

The girls were separated at the beginning of the trip, as Hanne had to bunk with her mother and baby sister in the family quarters, and Thea was put in the bow of the ship with the single women. Later. as sickness spread, Hanne was moved to the bow as well, and the two proclaimed their devotion to each other.

The writing is exceptional. Here is one descriptions of how Hanne feels when she is at one with a tree or a plant.

“One day I stood beside a banksia loud with honeyeaters and nectar. The music lifting from the tree was so joyful, I joined my voice to its singing, and as I sang, I thought of Thea. I yearned for her and I yearned to be absorbed by the banksia, and in the rising key of all the strains of growth, I felt the banksia admit me and we were together. We knew what it was to bud and blossom and eat the light. I felt the birds upon me like a visitation from God. That is how it happened.”

The author has written the story around comprehensive research of the journey of these European settlers who were fleeing religious persecution, just as the English pilgrims sought freedom in America. The local Peramangk people are credited with saving these uninvited, ill-equipped foreigners from starving, although the immigrants later chased them away from the livestock and gardens they established on Peramangk land. I'm sure the fact that South Australia was settled by free settlers, not convicts as the other states were, wouldn't have made the local indigenous people any happier.

But mainly, this is a love story, with passions running high and overshadowing everything else. These are girls in their teens. There is no question that it is praiseworthy for the writing alone, and I enjoyed the history. I did become impatient with Hanne’s continuous, overflowing of declarations of love. For me, this is a case of sometimes less is more. (I know, I know, this review is long, but almost half of it is Kent’s glorious prose!)

I enjoyed her debut, Burial Rites, about an historic trial in Iceland, and her second book, The Good People, about Ireland and its dangerous wee folk. It was a nice change to see her turn her talent to where she grew up herself.

Thanks to NetGalley and Pan McMillan Picador Australia for the copy for review.

Hannah Kent is one of my auto-buy authors. When I saw Devotion in upcoming releases, I added it to my TBR, no questions asked. While set in a historical period, we are not following the lives of those caught up in an infamous true crime case like her other two novels. It is a harrowing but enchanting story of love and the strive for freedom.

Devotion is set in an Old Lutheran village in Prussia during 1836 and follows Hanne Nussbaum. She is a child of nature and rebels against the structure and suffocating domestic domain of womanhood. She is odd and friendless until she meets Thea. We follow the pair as their families leave the only world, they have known their whole life to flee religious persecution as their Lutheran beliefs are against the King’s order for reform. The Old Lutheran’s have rejected the King’s union of the Protestant Churches. Hanne and Thea – along with the rest of the village – board a crowded, diseased-riddle ship bound for the new colony of South Australia.

Hannah Kent's prose is beautifully lyrical. There are whole sections that read like poetry, especially in the descriptions of nature and the setting. Hanne's drawn to nature. Since her village must practice their beliefs in secret and hold mass in the depths of the forest, the natural world and religion are intertwined for Hanne. The writing sucked me into the narrative. Many sections took my breath away — whether it was the depiction of the beauty of young love or at the oppressive descriptions of being cramped into an airless ship for six months.

If you are not a fan of overtly religious themes in your books, then this one might not be for you. For practising their Old Lutheran beliefs, Hanne's village is prosecuted. Hanne’s father is one of the Church elders. An integral part of Hanne's identity is religion. She is drawn to the hymns and hears music in nature around her. I am not religious, but I find religion endless fascinating, so the inclusion of scripture and hymns did not frustrate me. I found it helped to ground the characters into this slice of history.

The real heart of the story is Hanne and Thea. The pair meet in the forest. Hanne is expecting to be spurned by Thea, as she has been by the woman in the village. However, Thea offers Hanne acceptance. The pair soon become inseparable, and a friendship springs up fast between them. This friendship turns into a deep love as they spend endless days confined to their shared bunk in the bow of the ship.

Devotion is stepped in the culture and history. From the descriptions of the setting to outlining how the characters spend their days. It is apparent that Kent has done extensive research. Everything feels historical authentic, which is a signature of her writing. But as we move to the pilgrimage that Hanne and Thea are part of, the storyline branches from the fact and related and develops into this lush magical realism. I was not expecting this, but I adored every second.

I won’t stay too much more. I think the magic of this book comes from not knowing much and letting yourself get swept away. Devotion is a powerful exploration of love, grief and change. It will be one that resonates with me for a while. It was an absolute pleasure to read.

Australian author Hannah Kent burst on to the scene with her multi-award winning debut Burial Rites, a historical novel set in Iceland. She followed that up with a very different historical piece – The Good People, set in Ireland. In her third novel, Devotion, Kent comes closer to home, basing her story on the immigration of German religious communities fleeing persecution to South Australia in the mid 19th Century. Her first two novels revolved around tragedy and conflict, and while there is some tragedy in Devotion, its centrepiece is a love story.
The book opens in central Prussia in 1836. Teenage Hanne Nussbaum is part of a devout Lutheran community, struggling to maintain its religious identity. Hanne is having her own trouble, not conforming to the norms of the time and so friendless until a new family moves into town. Hanne meets Thea and her life changes. She finds she has a companion, someone who understands her and accepts her eccentricities and the two form a deep connection. Soon after that the whole village, together with other Lutheran communities, is offered a new start in South Australia by an English benefactor and they embark on an arduous six month voyage into the unknown. That voyage becomes a jump into the unknown in more ways than one and has a lasting impact on Hanne and Thea’s relationship.
To talk more about the plot will spoil some of the heartbreak, joy and revelation that Kent brings to her characters. The tale of the German immigration to South Australia is one of a new beginning but also part of the ongoing story of dispossession of the Aboriginal inhabitants of the land. Kent tries to bring a nuanced view of these events but cannot shy away from the fact that over time the immigrants “disfigured the land back into Prussia”. The whole, while interesting from a historical perspective and deeply effecting from a romantic one, lacks a little narrative tension. This is as a result of the choices Kent has made with relation to the characters which can leave readers feeling disconnected from any of the (fairly slight) drama, particularly in the second half of the book.
Kent’s once again excels in the descriptions of landscape and community that shone in her previous two books. And she manages to infuse the narrative with a longing and deep emotion. Which serves to make Devotion a powerful combination of lyric language, an affecting central relationship and historical detail.

I would highly recommend this book. Don’t expect it to be the same as Burial Rites or The Good People, it’s uniquely different. Hannah Kent is a brilliant writer, intellectually, lyrically, musically. She brings a ghostly luminescence and sense of poetry to her storytelling through the characters and nature. “Devotion” is aptly named and is a powerful, intense, love story about devotion to another person. I enjoyed the history lesson Kent gives us, educating us about the treacherous journey of the Lutherans from Prussia in the early 1800s to their settlement in Hahndorf just outside Adelaide S.A.

It was such a long-awaited joy to return to the writing of Hannah Kent, whose previous two novels, Burial Rights and The Good People, are both firm favourites of mine. I love the way she writes, the way she plays with language, the way she conjures such visual imagery with her words. And there is some truly beautiful writing within her latest release, Devotion. Once again, she returns to the genre of historical fiction, and I was lost within the passages of time inside the world she has created, following a large group of Old Lutherans journey from one side of the world to the other. The journey on the ship was such an immersion into history, I really enjoyed that part of the novel, the hardships endured, all in the name of a new life free from religious persecution.

There is a supernatural element to this novel that marks it as different to her others. I am not opposed to supernatural threads woven into a story and at times I didn’t mind this one, but at others, I felt it pulling me out of the story. There were times when I just couldn’t envisage what the author was describing and others where I felt it was all just wandering too far from the bones of the story – or at least, what I felt were the bones, which I acknowledge may be different to the author’s intent.

One thing that is very much evident though is that this story just pulses with love. I feel like it has been written by someone who has experienced the sort of devotion that the novel is based upon, and that is a very grand thing to be able to express. At its heart, this novel represents love in its highest form, pure and transcending. It’s very raw and at times, heartbreaking, but also illuminating. I’ll be honest, this is not my favourite by Hannah Kent, but any fan of hers will be glad to revisit her writing in this latest offering and I think that each reader’s response will be an entirely individualised one.

‘If others are here, as I am, we are as unseen to one another as the living. The lonely dead, wishing for ghosts of our own.’

Thanks to the publisher for the review copy.

3.5★s

Hanne Nussbaum loved nature more than she loved her fellow humans. Of course she loved her mother and father, her brother Matthias but she felt awkward around others, as if she wasn’t good enough for them. Hanne was never happier than when she was in the forest. Until she met Thea and had a friend at last. Thea’s parents had recently arrived to the Prussian village of Kay in 1836, and Thea’s mother was a healer. But when the whole village, most of whom were Lutheran worshippers which was banned, were offered the chance to emigrate to South Australia, the excitement of being free at last to worship as they wished was wonderful.

The long journey to Hamburg where they would embark took its toll, then the six month ocean voyage took a further toll. A small ship, not large enough to cater to the 200 souls who were on board, it wasn’t long before passengers began to die, and typhus raged through the berths. The conditions were appalling. Would their new start in the colony in South Australia be worth the challenges they faced?

Devotion by Aussie author Hannah Kent is one I was looking forward to, but I found myself overwhelmed at ‘everything’ that was included in this beautifully written book. I feel Devotion would be classified as Literary Fiction (of which I'm not fond), as well as Historical. The descriptions of Hanne and her family’s hardship on the ship, the beauty of her love of nature with the music from the trees and river, Hanne’s familial love for Matthias and much more, made for a special read, but for me, a difficult one.

With thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my digital ARC to read in exchange for an honest review.

I am not sure where to start in reviewing this book, for me it felt too much. There was too much passion, sadness, heartbreak, hope and love packed into this book.
It starts in the early 1800's in Prussia. Hanne is. a teenager who lives in a small lutheran community where she is friendless and feels unwanted by her community and family. She is different in that she can hear trees and other music in nature. When Thea, the daughter of a rumoured 'witch' moves with her family to the village, Hanne finally feels like she has found her soul mate.
Soon after this, the community is funded to make the move to Australia to establish a new lutheran community. The six months on the ship out to Australia is gruelling and an event occurs that provides a real twist in the story. After this event I cannot say I enjoyed the book nearly as much, as it took on a more supernatural tone.
I think I will be in the minority with my opinion on this as the book is very beautifully written and certain characters struck a chord with me.
Thank you Pan McMillan Australia and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

‘It is time, I think, to tell my story.’

Prussia, 1836. Johanne (Hanne) Nussbaum is almost 15 years old, living with her family in the village of Kay. Her family are part of a community of Old Lutherans, which the King wants to reform. Bound by their interpretation of God’s law, the community seeks to move to a place where they will not be further persecuted. Hanne is different. She does not fit easily into the community because she does not conform to their expectations. She is close to her twin brother Matthias but has no close friends until Dorothea (Thea) Eichenwald and her family arrive. Hanne and Thea become close.

The families of Kay are finally granted permission to leave Prussia, their voyage to South Australia is arranged, and in 1838 they board a ship. All aboard are looking forward to new beginnings. Hanne and Thea are inseparable. They love each other. But the ship is overcrowded, and the six-month journey will take its toll. Illness and poor food in cramped unhygienic conditions means that not all will survive the journey.

There are some magical moments on this horrific journey: Hanne is in touch with nature wherever she is. One of the most memorable scenes is when Hanne, on the deck of the ship, sees a whale breach. She hears the songs in nature and appreciates them.

And now I will stop telling you about the story because to fully appreciate Ms Kent’s magic, you need to read it unspoiled. The historical setting for this novel is based on the real-life settlement of Old Lutherans at Hahndorf in South Australia’s Barossa Valley. This provides the framework for a beautifully imagined story of transcendent love and devotion.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Pan Macmillan Australia for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Categories: The queer love story you’ve been waiting for / Prose like poetry / There were gay people in history too
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So, if you’ve ever heard of or read any of Hannah Kent’s work, you’ll know her writing is absolutely delicious. And this was a feast.
Beginning in 1830s Prussia, the story follows Hanne, a girl on the edge of womanhood who finds herself more often than not excluded from the company of her peers. Until Thea moves into the village…
You can see where this is going, I’m sure, but you can’t possibly predict the magic and pain and longing that Kent is able to conjure.
Except then both Hanne and Thea, along with their families, are uprooted and find themselves escaping religious persecution and on a ship sailing to start a new life in Australia.
To say much more would be to ruin the experience that is Devotion. Historical fiction, let alone historical romance, is not really a genre I find myself wading into very often — but I know with Kent that her writing never labours to get the point across, her descriptions never bore, and her characters feel like people you know as opposed to cutouts from a history textbook. And there seems a modernity about the telling of this tale, a looking back from a wiser perspective that colours the naïveté of Hanne as she stumbles along. It gives the whole novel a wash of nostalgia that makes your heart ache.
So while the themes in this novel differ substantially from her previous two novels, I think it still has all the hallmarks of a Hannah Kent novel, and it may just be her best yet.