La Rochelle's Road

In 1866 Daniel Peterson and his family give up their comfortable life in London for an unseen farm on Banks Peninsula. Daniel plans to make a fortune growing grass-seed; until he does so there can be no going back. But the realities of a remote hill country block are very different to the cosy imaginings of a clerk. The Petersons find themselves at the mercy of the land the weather and their few neighbours - a motley suspicious assortment of old whalers escaped convicts wary French settlers and true-blue Tory squatters. Even their own house has a secret to hide - that of its first inhabitant the scandalous Etienne La Rochelle and his Maori lover. When Daniel's daughter Hester discovers La Rochelle's journal it leads her on a journey of discovery - a path into a world of beauty darkness and illicit love which she may follow if she dares.