There are some elements in good saga writing that never fail, and Lesley Pearse has the full measure of them in Trust Me. She is particularly good on the theme of the orphanage survivor who makes her way in a hostile world: familiar, perhaps, but rarely treated with the colour and exuberance found here. Dulcie Taylor and her sister May, who have spent their lives having their trust betrayed by those who claim they will look after them, begin a new life in a new country. Australia soon turns out to be a grim illusion, however, until Dulcie meets Ross, who has also known what it is to be an orphanage survivor. With a narrative that has the epic qualities of the country it is set in, Pearse is able to deal with the growth of trust and love between the characters in a wholly convincing fashion, with Dulcie a memorably drawn heroine. --Barry Forshaw

The hardships suffered by the earliest emigrants from Britain to Australia are well-chronicled. Most were criminals. But few know that there was another wave of reluctant emigration as recently as the 1940s/50s. These were not criminals. They were children who had already suffered, some for years, vicious and malicious ill-treatment at the hands of nuns and 'brothers' in English orphanages attached to Roman Catholic convents and monasteries. This is a work of fiction, but close enough to the experiences of many young people of the late-20th century to have a strong core of truth. It concerns a young Australian boy, Ross, and English half-sisters Dulcie and May. The girls' early life was relatively happy, though as the children of incompatible parents there were bad moments. Then, through sheer mischance, they were left parentless and after a brief spell with their grandmother, were summarily despatched to a convent where, behind a bland facade, their treatment was inexplicably sadistic. An offer of a transfer to sunny Australia, half a world away, came as a relief - but not for long. The mistreatment continued, followed, for Dulcie by virtual slavery in the outback, as the unpaid servant of a farmer hacking out an embryo holding from virgin land. May, more cunning, found an easier life with a rich family, but both girls, in their different ways, were to carry the scars of their childhood for the rest of their lives - as did Ross, whose treatment by the 'brothers' caused traumas from which he never recovered. There is a glimpse of the fabled sunshine for Dulcie in adulthood, but only because of her strength of character and the kinder people she met along the way. For May and Ross the story is bleaker. Although much of it is grim, this is a gripping story that needed telling. (Kirkus UK)