Review: The Cartographer’s Secret by Tea Cooper

Title: The Cartographer’s Secret by Tea Cooper
Publisher: Harper Muse
Genre: Historical, Australian, Mystery, Romance
Length: 400 pages
Book Rating: B+

Complimentary Review Copy Provided by Publisher Through NetGalley

Summary:

A map into the past. A long-lost young woman. And a thirty-year family mystery.

The Hunter Valley, 1880—Evie Ludgrove loves to chart the landscape around her home—hardly surprising since she grew up in the shadow of her father’s obsession with the great Australian explorer Dr. Ludwig Leichhardt. So when an advertisement appears in The Bulletin magazine offering a thousand-pound reward for proof of where Leichhardt met his fate, Evie is determined to use her father’s papers to unravel the secret. But when Evie sets out to prove her theory, she vanishes without a trace, leaving behind a mystery that haunts her family for thirty years.

1911—Letitia Rawlings arrives at the family estate in her Ford Model T to inform her great-aunt Olivia of a loss in their family. But Letitia is also escaping her own problems—her brother’s sudden death, her mother’s scheming, and her dissatisfaction with the life planned out for her. So when Letitia discovers a beautifully illustrated map that might hold a clue to the fate of her missing aunt, Evie Ludgrove, she sets out to discover the truth. But all is not as it seems, and Letitia begins to realize that solving the mystery of her family’s past could offer as much peril as redemption.

A gripping historical mystery for fans of Kate Morton and Natasha Lester’s The Paris Seamstress, The Cartographer’s Secret follows a young woman’s quest to heal a family rift as she becomes entangled in one of Australia’s greatest historical puzzles.

“The Cartographer’s Secret is a galvanizing, immersive adventure following a family’s entanglement with a vanished Australian explorer through the lush Hunter Valley at the turn of the twentieth century, forcing the characters to reckon with the choice found at the crux of passion and loyalty and the power of shared blood that can either destroy or heal.” —Joy Callaway, international bestselling author of The Fifth Avenue Artists Society and The Greenbrier Resort

• Daphne du Maurier Award Winner, 2021
• Historical story with both romance and mystery
• Full-length, stand-alone novel (c. 104,000 words)
• Includes discussion questions for book clubs

Review:

The Cartographer’s Secret by Tea Cooper is an engrossing, multi-layered historical novel which takes place in Australia.

In 1880, Evie Ludgrove is a gifted artist who prefers spending time with her father and exploring the surrounding area. Her older sister Miriam yearns for city life and she is soon off to Sydney to marry. Evie and her Aunt Olivia stay at home and Olivia runs the family business. Meanwhile, Evie is attempting to solve a mystery that has long been unanswered. German explorer Dr. Ludwig Leichhardt’s mysterious disappearance has remained unsolved for decades. Believing the clues to his fate might be in her father’s diary, Evie formulates a secret plan she hopes will finally explain what happened to Leichhardt on his last expedition. Evie believes she knows where she might find the evidence she needs and she sets out on a journey from which she never returns.

In 1911, twenty-five-year-old Letitia “Lettie” Rawlings is mourning the death of beloved brother Thorne. She is an independent woman who envisions a different future for herself than her mother, Miriam. She is shocked when her mother decides to confront her estranged aunt, Olivia, over a family inheritance. Needing distance from her grief, Lettie convinces her mother to allow her to go instead. She is a little leery of the reception awaiting her yet she eagerly sets on her trip in Thorne’s Model T.

After an awkward first meeting, Olivia soon warms up to Lettie and she reveals intriguing information about their family. Lettie is still uncertain of the details she has learned but she agrees to Olivia’s request that she try to find out what happened to Evie who has now been missing for thirty years. A lot has changed over the intervening years, but Lettie is soon immersed in the same papers that her aunt was looking over before her disappearance. Is it possible Lettie can unravel the mystery of what happened to Evie after all these years? And will she find out what happened to Dr. Ludwig Leichhardt ill-fated expedition?

The Cartographer’s Secret is a captivating historical novel that seamlessly weaves fact and fiction into an interesting family drama. The characters are richly developed with all too human foibles. The storyline is fascinating and the setting springs vibrantly to life. The mystery surrounding Evie’s disappearance is compelling and Tea Cooper brings this fast-placed novel to a gratifying conclusion.