Case 2 - Novels, Dunedin & Environs

Essie Summers. Sweet are the Ways. London: Mills & Boon, 1965.

Essie Summers. Sweet are the Ways. London: Mills & Boon, 1965.

Sweet are the Ways and My Lady of the Fuchsias are set in Fair-acre Valley, a fictional location on the Taieri plains south of Outram. Sweet are the Ways was the author’s favourite work. Her heroine, a former advertising copywriter for a drapery business (just like Essie), also moonlights as a hard-working novelist. Fair-acre’s minister, Dougal MacNab, shares personality traits and his calling with William Flett, Essie's husband. The MacNabs appear again in My Lady of the Fuchsias.

Essie Summers. Sweet are the Ways. London: Mills & Boon, 1965.

Essie Summers. Sweet are the Ways. London: Mills & Boon, 1965.
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Essie Summers. Goblin Hill. London: Mills & Boon, 1977.

Essie Summers. Goblin Hill. London: Mills & Boon, 1977.

Goblin Hill has a rural East Otago setting, near Moeraki. Faith Charteris arrives to transcribe family history stories. This pattern was repeated by Summers herself between 1988 and 1994 when she researched and wrote Summers family stories heard as a child.

Essie Summers. Goblin Hill. London: Mills & Boon, 1977.

Essie Summers. Goblin Hill. London: Mills & Boon, 1977.
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Essie Summers. My Lady of the Fuchsias. London Mills & Boon, 1979.

Essie Summers. My Lady of the Fuchsias. London Mills & Boon, 1979.

Essie Summers. My Lady of the Fuchsias. London Mills & Boon, 1979.

Essie Summers. My Lady of the Fuchsias. London Mills & Boon, 1979.
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