Publisher: Berkley Publishing House Published February 16th 2021

Format: ebook

Pages: 400

Rating: 4/5 stars

Synopsis (from Goodreads):

Nearly two hundred condemned women on board a sailing ship bound for Australia. One of them is a murderer. From debut author Hope Adams comes a thrilling novel based on the 1841 voyage of the convict ship Rajah, about confinement, hope, and the terrible things we do to survive.
London, 1841. One hundred eighty Englishwomen file aboard the Rajah, embarking on a three-month voyage to the other side of the world.
They’re daughters, sisters, mothers–and convicts.
Transported for petty crimes.
Except one of them has a deadly secret, and will do anything to flee justice.
As the Rajah sails farther from land, the women forge a tenuous kinship. Until, in the middle of the cold and unforgiving sea, a young mother is mortally wounded, and the hunt is on for the assailant before he or she strikes again.
Each woman called in for question has something to fear: Will she be attacked next? Will she be believed? Because far from land, there is nowhere to flee, and how can you prove innocence when you’ve already been found guilty?

My review:

Thank you Berkley Publishing Group for the copy of this book.
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I wasn’t too sure what to expect from this book as it takes place for the most part on board a ship, but I absolutely loved it. The book follows a group of female convicts as they make their way from England to Australia (or an island around Australia?). While on the ship, a terrible crime is committed and we spend the book reading back and forth from the time they leave to the time of the crime, piecing together the pieces.
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I really appreciated the overall message of the book; that female criminals that were being transported were criminals because of the circumstances they were either forced into, or born into, and not because they were bad people. I also really liked the mystery element of the book.
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Finally, I really liked the character of Kezia. She is on board to look after the women, and throughout the trial, she seems to really care about the women. She starts a sewing project to keep the women occupied, which was cool.
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Overall, an enjoyable story.