New Zealand owes much to the writing of Jenny Pattrick. Denniston Rose, one of our bestselling novels ever, focused attention on home-grown history and converted it into mainstream readership. Pattrick followed this debut with a stream of fictionalised histories. Fast-forward to the present day.
The title of Sea Change is meant literally, as a community is ravaged by a tsunami after a violent earthquake. Unnamed but located on the Kāpiti Coast of the North Island, it is a typical small town. A handy map at the beginning of the book illustrates the layout: church, school, community hall, rugby field, railway station and numerous small houses, sandwiched between the overshadowing hills and the roaring sea.
As the tsunami strikes, the sea wall is breached, reducing the village to a fraction of its size. On the same day, aftershocks create rockfalls in the hills, blocking off outside access as “tonnes and tonnes of rock roar down the hill and out to sea”.
Within the reduced housing area lives a group of self-named “individualists and alternative oddballs”. Lorna, an older ex-government servant; Toddy, her neighbour, blind and recently widowed; 9-year-old Eru; and Gus, 60-ish, a bit of a mystery but “fit as a young man”. His neighbours Dot, “tiny and neat”, and Flo, “built like a tank”, comprise the Plumbelles and handily know all there is to know of the district’s plumbing. Above the town, Dylan, a recluse “with a clever mind”, witnesses the “tiny people running, leaving the log-jam of cars by the shops, heading on foot up the hill road”.
The village is completely cut off and help is slow to arrive. Food and water drops are intermittent and it behoves the community to pull together temporary systems of supply and infrastructure. Basic and creative ingenuity is the result. Rainwater tanks, electric car batteries, solar panels and vege gardens are pooled for community use, as are individual strengths and skills.
The reason for the lack of government help becomes apparent with the helicopter arrival of the newly minted Minister for the Alpine Fault Disaster to announce the imminent need for a managed retreat from the area. Behind this unwanted decision is the owner of the “big house” in the village, wealthy businessman Adrian Stokes. Rumours indicate a link between his business interests and strong government lobbyists as he sneakily buys selected land plots.
He dreams of a commercial future for the village as a boutique coastal resort, but our self-sufficient villagers love their present homes more than the need for comfort elsewhere. The scene is set for a battle.
Pattrick’s novel offers classic themes: good vs bad, authority vs community, wealth vs resourcefulness, greed vs friendship. The bad are certainly bad, swerving towards the stereotypical with their self-serving, vindictive and misogynistic attitudes, but the tale more than makes up for this with a community of colourful, warm and realistic characters standing up for themselves in the face of adversity, and not without a good dose of humour.
Beyond the personal stories, Pattrick evokes a strong sense of place. The remaining concrete buildings are “favoured perches for the family of herons waiting for the waves to usher in small delicacies”.
A final comment on the biggest battle of all should not go unsaid: “Who can say which will win: the natural tilt upwards of the land, caused by subduction, or the rising seawater caused by human folly.”
For the Listener’s recent interview with Jenny Pattrick, go here.
