Sisters is the story of four young women coming of age on a rural
property in northern Victoria. But it is also the story of Guthrie
Carey, a young sailor whose life crosses paths with the sisters at
various points. The perils and pitfalls of love and marriage dominate
the story. It would seem that Cambridge had a pretty cynical view and
very low expectations for happiness within the confines of marriage. We
have an unhappy marriage with a power imbalance, a domestic goddess
whose life is taken up with child bearing and child rearing, an
adulteress, a nursemaid, a man still in love with his former wife's
ghost and a lonely old, man dreaming of a love that will never be! If
Sisters is a good representation of her work, I'll definitely look for
more. She doesn't write as broadly or deeply as Henry Handel Richardson,
but she does take on women's concerns and class consciousness in a
period when this wasn't really the thing to do in writing. The
conversation and descriptions in Sisters are fantastic. Particularly
well-developed characters like Debbie and Carey will stay with me for a
very long time.