AustLit

Exemplary tale of Christian love and principles set in Victorian mountains and Melbourne. Mona Lester married Frank when she was 16 and left her bush mining township for Melbourne. Easy-going lazy Frank was a good-tempered husband, tolerant of Mona's parish activities but not her intellectual or spiritual equal. A chance meeting with Herbert Grey introduces her to both, and they unknowingly fall in love though he too is married - to an alcoholic ex-barmaid of the diggings where he knew Frank, and has 3 children. Once they discover their true feelings he moves to the country, then to England when she declares she can never betray her marriage vows. He becomes a philanthropist and returns to Australia with his children after his wife's death. Mona won her battle with sin, however her sister Esther is tempted by a handsome but dissolute youth, seduced and left penniless and ruined on Melbourne's streets. She is befriended by a poor factory girl who helps her find work and shelters her in her room at Richmond. The girl dies and Esther's downward fall continues after leaving her baby with Mona. Mona's search for her takes her through the worst dens of vice beneath 'The Queen City of the South', and eventually they are reunited through the accidental shooting of Mona by Esther ... (PB)