A Place to Call Home — Roberta Grieve

The Williams family have been living on the hulks, derelict warships moored alongside Sheerness dockyard, homes for the dockyard workers and their families. Still grieving for her mother, Emily is determined to make a home for her father and siblings. They move into a small cottage in Blue Town, the settlement just beyond the dockyard wall. Dismayed by the cramped conditions and lack of facilities, Emily determines to make the best of it, telling herself anything is better than the damp and mouldy hulks. Emily finds an escaped convict hiding in the woodshed and takes in the cold and wet young man. Harry is terrified of the gang who coerced him in to helping them. Emily and her father persuade him to turn himself in and he promises to go straight in future. It is love at first sight for the young couple and Emily is devastated when Harry is transported to Australia to finish his sentence. When her father is injured in a dockyard accident, a friend, Lenny, brings him home and helps to look after him. He wangles his way into the family home in the guise of friendship. Emily, although she can never forget Harry, is taken in by him and they marry. Meanwhile Harry finishes his sentence and works hard to save enough to return to England and find Emily. Will the young lovers ever be reunited or will Lenny stand in the way?