Savage Odyssey © John Lewis 2024

 SYNOPSIS

Jessica Glider, a young woman from Hampshire, is falsely accused and convicted of attacking Sir Rory Fitzparsons, a local squire. To give himself free access to Jessica, Fitzparsons had earlier organized for her fiancé, Will Noling, to be pressed into the navy and later transported to New South Wales.

Jessica is transported to New South Wales where she is assigned, on prior arrangement by Fitzparsons, to Garth Barlester, his equally loathsome cousin. During her incarceration, the innocent Jessica teams up with the worldly Elizabeth Crowling as a result of each taking some risk to protect the interests of the other shortly after they first meet. And so develops an uncompromising ‘Wither thou goest, I will go,’ relationship that provides the underlying theme of the story.

Elizabeth assists Jessica to escape from the colony with the aid of the crew of an American sloop. When the sloop is wrecked on the north coast of New South Wales, the women are separated, with each believing the other has drowned. Elizabeth is saved by members of the crew who have managed to launch a boat. Jessica, in the meantime is swept ashore where she is taken under the protection of the native warrior Gunroi. After spending over two years with Gunroi and his clan, Jessica is recaptured and returned to Barlester. But when he takes her with him to his property on the Hunter River north of Sydney, Gunroi learns of this and rescues her, killing Barlester when he tries to intervene. Jessica then accompanies Gunroi back into the wilderness.

When Fitzparsons subsequently inherits Garth Barlester's properties in New South Wales, he travels to the colony and becomes a leading participant in the hunt for Gunroi, who is now a felon with a price on his head.

As a consequence of sailors who had fallen overboard from both the USS Chesapeake and HMS Shannon being taken into Boston after the battle between the ships during the War of 1812, Elizabeth, who has been living in the city since her escape, learns that Jessica is still alive. She then returns to New South Wales to bring her friend in from the wild. This brings all the main surviving participants in the drama together with bloody consequence.