The Lace Balcony (80 page)

Like the remarkable DAVID SCOTT MITCHELL who bequeathed his lifetime's collection of Australiana and founded the Mitchell Library, CAROLINE SIMPSON, nee FAIRFAX, endowed her private collection as a gift to the nation. Future generations are indebted to these inordinately generous Australian benefactors.

FRANCES PRENTICE, Library Manager for 25 years at the wonderful Australian National Maritime Museum at Darling Harbour, gave me wonderful insight into the shipping history of Port Jackson.

To the librarians of Balmain and Leichhardt Library and the archivists of the State Records Office of N.S.W. I give my sincere thanks for their help in my research for my three historical novels.

Finally I must thank my late (but intensely punctual) father, Fred Parsons, for the title of
The Lace Balcony,
which lay dormant at the back of my mind until I discovered it fitted this book like a lace glove. Growing up in Sydney and Melbourne I was deeply attracted to the ‘iron lace' of colonial buildings, ranging from upper-class mansions to the balconies of working-class cottages – the distinctive quality that gives Australian architecture its charming colonial roots.

I had long harboured the popular myth that this wrought and cast iron arrived as ballast on sailing ships. In fact much was transported from England (Bath and Bristol) and France, carefully wrapped in packing cases. The Colony soon manufactured its own from European designs, and later incorporated Australian images of kookaburras, waratahs, koalas and emus.

It is said ‘all things come to he who waits.' I now live in a convict-built cottage in Sydney, and am currently restoring an iron lace Juliet balcony I salvaged from a wrecking yard.

Meanwhile
The Lace Balcony
is in your hands.

I am most fortunate to have my third novel
The Lace Balcony
in the hands of Simon and Schuster's exceptionally gifted Australian publishers, Managing Director Lou Johnson, Head of Publishing Larissa Edwards and their highly creative team. It has been a real pleasure working for the first time with Managing Editor, Roberta Ivers, who has been an encouraging, guiding light throughout the editing process. I was also delighted to have as my copy editor author Belinda Castles. Both have a deep understanding and love of Australian history and their insight, suggestions and guidance enhanced
The Lace Balcony.

Selwa Anthony, my agent and friend since the development of my first saga,
Ironbark,
can always be relied upon for straight-talking and empathy in equal measure. Selwa deserves my warmest praise for all she has done for me. I greatly appreciate the help given me by Selwa's husband, Brian Dennis, and their daughter Linda Anthony. My agent in Germany, Bastian Schlück, deserves my sincere thanks for his role in the German publication of all three of my novels.

From my father, comedy scriptwriter Fred Parsons, I inherited an extraordinary legacy – the support of a band of friends who Dad greatly admired for their total professionalism, integrity and loyalty – the incomparable radio host Philip Brady, comedy writer and author Mike McColl Jones, Ned Kelly historian and author Ian Jones, and comedienne Denise Drysdale.

As always my family is my strength. Author and former television producer Brian Nicholls has been invaluable at all stages of the manuscript. The actors in my family, my son Nicholas Cassim and his partner Niki Owen, along with my grandchildren, Eadie Cassim, seven, and Gus Cassim, four, keep my sense of humour buoyant and my energy recharged.

I am indebted to readers of early drafts of
The Lace Balcony:
Anne Robinson, Western Australian teacher, whose insightful notes and memory for Australian memorabilia drew my attention to the delightful letter written by Mrs Elizabeth Shaw at the Swan River
Colony; and to Wendy Smith, an equine consultant and book-lover whose horse-sense was invaluable.

Under pressure of deadlines I experienced moments of serendipity. Pamela Clark (Food and Editorial Director The Australian Wome
n's Weekly Cookbooks), sent me one of her famous fruit cakes that for weeks sustained body and soul as I struggled to meet a deadline.

Barbara Radzevicus presented me with a work of art, a hand-made patchwork quilt she designed with images of books and called ‘Johanna's Dreaming.'

Special thanks are due to very special people. Dr Stephen Shumach's long support; wise counsel from Judy and John Barry in Switzerland; the members of ISAA (Independent Scholars Association of Australia); Richard McCabe for his knowledge of snakes and native flora; Liam Kinney of the Australian Youth Orchestra for his advice on music; Marilyn and Warwick Harvey's knowledge of herbal medicine.

My thanks to Philip Bray who gave me confidence and wise publishing advice before the acceptance of my first novel
Ironbark –
and who continues to support Australian authors.

Extended family and friends gave me unstinting support: Bill and Penny Owen, of ‘Wydidya', North Star, NSW; Toni Donald, Michael Cassim, Catherine Taylor; Joan and Colin Nicholls, Joy and Les Scruse; David and Chele Muldoon; Donna, ‘my sister the scientist'; my ‘Intrepid Sister' Janette Boot; Jan and Craig Collie; Enid Morrison; Chloe Rowse, Jeff and Lyn Malley, Eddie Mazur-Malley; Batsheva Abrahams and ‘Umbilical Brother' David Collins; Rhonda Nadas; Ron and Noelle Way at Kyogle; in rural Victoria, Keira and Graham Lochyer at Hepburn Springs, Lionel and Delys Dunk at Forge Creek and the people of Blackwood; Yetta Einfeld, Rosalind Brennan, Rev. David and Stephanie Hilton, Dr Ron and Dr Susi Freeman; and TV presenter and friend Jan Wood.

Not least my thanks to Mariella Nucifora who was instrumental in my discovery of the loft-house that inspired
The Lace Balcony's
Rockingham Hall – whose fictional family I named in tribute to my never-forgotten friend in England, Mrs Pat L'Estrange.

Johanna Nicholls comes from a theatrical family. She was a journalist and magazine feature writer in Sydney, Melbourne and London. In television she worked as a researcher/writer and Head Script Editor of TV Drama at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

Johanna has lived in England, Italy and Greece. Her home is an 1830s convict-built sandstone cottage in Birchgrove, Sydney where she is currently writing her fourth Australian historical novel and researching her fifth. Her first saga,
Ironbark,
was published by Simon and Schuster in Australia and New Zealand in 2009 and 2010.
Ghost Gum Valley
was published in 2012 and 2013.
The Lace Balcony
is her third novel to have been translated into German and published in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Also by Johanna Nicholls

Ghost Gum Valley

Ironbark

THE LACE BALCONY

First published in Australia in 2014 by

Simon & Schuster (Australia) Pty Limited

Suite 19A, Level 1, 450 Miller Street, Cammeray, NSW 2062

www.SimonandSchuster.com

A CBS Company

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Visit our website at
www.simonandschuster.com.au

© Johanna Nicholls 2014

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the publisher.

The right of Johanna Nicholls to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her under the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

Author:

Nicholls, Johanna, author.

Title:

The lace balcony/Johanna Nicholls.

ISBN:

9781922052698 (paperback)

9781922052711 (ebook)

Subjects:

Australian fiction.

Historical fiction.

Dewey Number:

A823.4

Cover design: Blue Cork

Cover image: Richard Jenkins

Typeset by: Midland Typesetters, Australia

The paper this book is printed on is certified against the Forest Stewardship Council® Standards. Griffin Press holds FSC chain of custody certification SGS-COC-005088. FSC promotes environmentally responsible, socially beneficial and economically viable management of the world's forests.