Tuesday, April 14, 2020

Book: Maralinga





Summary: During the darkest days of the Cold War, in the remote wilderness of a South Australian desert, the future of an infant nation is being decided ... without its people’s knowledge.

A British airbase in the middle of nowhere; an atomic weapons testing ground; an army of raw youth led by powerful, ambitious men - a cocktail for disaster. Such is Maralinga in the spring of 1956.

MARALINGA is the story of British Lieutenant Daniel Gardiner, who accepts a twelve-month posting to the wilds of South Australia on a promise of rapid promotion; Harold Dartleigh, Deputy Director of MI6 and his undercover operative Gideon Melbray; Australian Army Colonel Nick Stratton and the enigmatic Petraeus Mitchell, bushman and anthropologist. They all find themselves in a violent and unforgiving landscape, infected with the unique madness and excitement that only nuclear testing creates.

MARALINGA is also a story of love; a love so strong that it draws the adventurous young English journalist Elizabeth Hoffmann halfway around the world in search of the truth. And MARALINGA is a story of heartbreak; heartbreak brought to the innocent First Australians who had walked their land unhindered for 40,000 years.

Maralinga ... a desolate place where history demands an emerging nation choose between hell and reason.


What I Thought: WOW! I've never read a Judy Nunn and had always wanted to read this. Brilliant. I feel like I've learnt so much about our shameful past.

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