The Party Line by Sue Orr

1970s rural New Zealand is the setting for The Party Line; the title refers to the days (which I can remember!) of small rural communities making every phone call through an operator and a shared party telephone line.  This meant that potentially people could and sometimes did listen in on private conversations, resulting in everybody knowing everybody else’s business, especially in the fictional dairy farming district of Fenward, in the Thames Valley.

The novel begins with fifty-four year old Nicola Walker driving home for the funeral of her family’s old sharemilker, all the while remembering her upbringing and difficult relationship with her now dead mother.  Each chapter comes from a different perspective: present day or pre-teen Nickie, her mother Joy, and new sharemilker Ian Baxter.

In 1972, grief stricken Ian Baxter has recently lost his beloved wife to cancer. He has a precocious thirteen year old daughter (Gabrielle) to support, so bluffs his way into a sharemilking job with Jack Gilbert: a dour man who hates farming.  While her father struggles to cope with overwhelming grief, a new job and a difficult boss, Gabrielle is left to her own devices. She comforts herself by dressing up in her mother’s old clothes, and by trying to shake up life in the conservative Thames Valley, with her new friend Nickie.  When the two girls witness a disturbing domestic attack they turn to the adults for support.  They receive none, and are shocked by the double standards of adults and their unwillingness to face the truth.

Nickie’s mother Joy takes pride in her standing in the community; being part of the welcoming committee for new sharemilkers, preserving her family’s reputation and being part of the  politics and pettiness of her local Country Women’s Institute. She struggles to cope with her changing daughter and the unpleasant truths she reveals.

I loved The Party Line; it vividly tells a story of rural New Zealand’s recent past: the social order, great characters, community spirit, and morally dubious adult complicity.

Posted by Katrina

Catalogue link: The Party Line