"The True Green of Hope" by N. A. Bourke. [review]

Abstract

We tend to think of the Gold Coast as a haven for the idle rich, but in "The True Green of Hope" it is a place where people live, work, and struggle with their demons just like the rest of us. The only difference is that the weather is kinder to the homeless — and there’s always the beach. This engaging but pensive novel is preoccupied with relationships between lesbian lovers, sisters, mothers and daughters, and a five-year-old niece whose cuteness sometimes cloys. Men are marginal, either irrelevant or a bad memory from younger days on the streets.