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'San Francisco, 1849. The hills are swarming with desperate men from all over the world, come to seek their fortune in the grip of yellow fever. In their wake come the opportunists, not least of whom are the Australians, many of them former convicts who are quick to seize control in a lawless world. This group of Australians, headed by the standover man Thomas Keane, are known as The Coves.
'Enter twelve-year-old Samuel Bellamy, formerly of the Swan River Colony, lately of Van Dieman’s Land, in search of his mother who, last he heard, has gone to join the molly-houses in California.
'Sydney-town, San Francisco, is a world of opportunism, loyalty and violent betrayal, and Samuel must learn to be a man if he is to survive. ' (Publication summary)
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Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Other Formats
- Sound recording.
- Large print.
- Dyslexic edition.
Works about this Work
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David Whish-Wilson : The Coves
2019
single work
review
— Appears in: The Newtown Review of Books , January 2019;'David Whish-Wilson is best known for his historical crime fiction set in Perth and surrounds, but The Coves takes us to 1849 San Francisco, gold fever and the Australian gangs who controlled the part of it known as Sydney-town.' (Introduction)
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'The Coves' by David Whish-Wilson
2018
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , October no. 405 2018; (p. 59)'A small bay is a cove, and so is a man, according to old-fashioned slang. The Coves takes advantage of this coincidence: it’s a story about a gang of men that rules ‘Sydney Cove’ in the mid-nineteenth century. But this is not the familiar Sydney Cove in New South Wales. There is another one across the Pacific in San Francisco, where arrivals from Australia, ‘pioneers in … viciousness and depravity’, were said to commit ‘atrocious crimes’, according to the novel’s epigraph from Herbert Asbury’s The Barbary Coast (1933).' (Introduction)
-
'The Coves' by David Whish-Wilson
2018
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , October no. 405 2018; (p. 59)'A small bay is a cove, and so is a man, according to old-fashioned slang. The Coves takes advantage of this coincidence: it’s a story about a gang of men that rules ‘Sydney Cove’ in the mid-nineteenth century. But this is not the familiar Sydney Cove in New South Wales. There is another one across the Pacific in San Francisco, where arrivals from Australia, ‘pioneers in … viciousness and depravity’, were said to commit ‘atrocious crimes’, according to the novel’s epigraph from Herbert Asbury’s The Barbary Coast (1933).' (Introduction)
-
David Whish-Wilson : The Coves
2019
single work
review
— Appears in: The Newtown Review of Books , January 2019;'David Whish-Wilson is best known for his historical crime fiction set in Perth and surrounds, but The Coves takes us to 1849 San Francisco, gold fever and the Australian gangs who controlled the part of it known as Sydney-town.' (Introduction)
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San Francisco,
California,
cUnited States of America (USA),cAmericas,
- 1849
