A review by readingwithcake
On a Barbarous Coast by Craig Cormick, Harold Ludwick

3.0

Firstly this would have been a four star review except I found it disjointed due to the storyline jumping all over the place and I also didn’t like our main character, Magra. I didn’t connect with his part of the storyline and it was predominantly his POV. My favourite part of the book was the POV of Garrgiil, I enjoyed learning about the Guugu Yimidhirr people. It was fascinating to learn about their traditions and how misinterpreted their actions were by the British. Obviously this is a fictitious story however I do not doubt that similar occurrences happened between the two peoples meeting. My other favourite part was at the end when the men assimilated into the Guugu Yimidhirr tribe. This was what I was waiting for and offered the alternative ending to the colonisation of Australia. I found this book, particularly at the end, to be thoroughly educational and enjoyed this new take on the discovery of Australia by Cook and their interactions with First Nations people. This take on history demonstrates what could have happened if there had been a different approach to making contact with the Indigenous peoples and every other continent that was colonised by Europeans.