Africa's Eden

The third book in the Lilian's Eden series is about the difficult choices unmarried women in the 60s had to make, and the challenges of finding love in unexpected places.

As a young unmarried mother in the 1960s, Maureen faces stifling disapproval and condemnation from mainstream society. Desperate to create a new life for herself and her baby, she rekindles an old romance and moves to South Africa which is under Apartheid.

But her precarious journey to Africa’s Eden is not the paradise she anticipated. Cultures smash against each other, family relationships are strained, there is death and despair, violence and injustice. But there is also humour, fun, family and friendship, as Maureen has to decide where her future lies. Is it here in Africa or back home in distant Eden, in her Australian homeland?

Previous books by Cheryl Adam have been praised by Carmel Bird, Kristin Henry, Hazel Edwards, Amanda Lohrey and others. Her debut Lillian's Eden was compared favourably to The Dressmaker and Cloudstreet. Each book in the series has wonderfully drawn characters, drama, and humour, as they trace a family's history from the 1950s-70s, highlighting the remarkable resilience that enabled women—despite the difficult choices they faced—to find happiness in sometimes the most unlikely of places.

About the Author

Australian Cheryl Adam spent her childhood in rural Australia where her love of storytelling began. In the 1960s, she was deported from Kenya and arrived as an unwanted guest in Sweden. She later moved to South Africa where she lived for thirteen years and had five children before returning to Australia. After her husband's stroke, she took up study, completing a Masters in Fine Arts at Monash University before taking up writing. In 2018 at the age of 74, her first novel Lillian's Eden was published. Out of Eden followed in 2021 and Africa's Eden is the final volume of the Eden trilogy.