Discovering Katharine: A Novel

It is the mid-1960s in Perth and Vicki is bored, restless and up for a challenge. Like many young women of the day, she left school early, lives at home and toils away in a miserable job as a lowly paid typist. She finds solace in the company of her two work friends, Nora and Gwenda, with whom she shares morning tea, biscuits and the latest titbits of gossip. When Gwenda suggests she read by Katharine Susannah Prichard, life begins to look up for Vicki. The novel bowls Vicki over and she decides to read everything she can get hold of by and about Katharine, recording her discoveries in her diary. Gwenda supports Vicki's project, Nora doesn't. She's more interested in Gwenda's troubled relationship with her boyfriend, Andy. Vicki's mother thinks her daughter is wasting her time reading books by a local radical author when she should be looking for a nice boy to marry. But with the help of a friendly librarian and a retired schoolteacher to guide her through Katharine's works, Vicki uncovers a completely different way of looking at the world and slowly begins to chart a future that is entirely her own.