Silver Nutmeg

by Norah Lofts

Dutch spice merchant Evert Haan remembers his longing for a bride of quality when he learns that Annabet, the daughter of an old enemy, is yet unwed

Genres: Historical Fiction, Historical, Romance, Fiction, British Literature, Pirates

352 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1947

About the author

Norah Ethel Robinson Lofts Jorisch (27 August 1904–10 September 1983) was a 20th century best-selling British author. She wrote over fifty books specialising in historical fiction, but she also wrote non-fiction and short stories. Many of her novels, including her Suffolk Trilogy, follow the history of a specific house and the residents that lived in it.

Lofts was born in Shipdham, Norfolk in England. She also published using the pseudonyms Juliet Astley and Peter Curtis. Norah Lofts chose to release her murder-mystery novels under the pen name Peter Curtis because she did not want the readers of her historic fiction to pick up a murder-mystery novel and expect classic Norah Lofts historical fiction. However, the murders still show characteristic Norah Lofts elements. Most of her historical novels fall into two general categories: biographical novels about queens, among them Anne Boleyn, Isabella of Castile, and Catherine of Aragon; and novels set in East Anglia centered around the fictitious town of Baildon (patterned largely on Bury St. Edmunds). Her creation of this fictitious area of England is reminiscent of Thomas Hardy's creation of "Wessex"; and her use of recurring characters such that the protagonist of one novel appears as a secondary character in others is even more reminiscent of William Faulkner's work set in "Yoknapatawpha County," Mississippi. Norah Lofts' work set in East Anglia in the 1930s and 1940s shows great concern with the very poor in society and their inability to change their conditions. Her approach suggests an interest in the social reformism that became a feature of British post-war society.

Several of her novels were turned into films. Jassy was filmed as Jassy (1947) starring Margaret Lockwood and Dennis Price. You're Best Alone was filmed as Guilt is My Shadow (1950). The Devil's Own (also known as The Little Wax Doll and Catch As Catch Can) was filmed as The Witches (1966). The film 7 Women was directed by John Ford and based on the story Chinese Finale by Norah Lofts.

Reviews

[Summer]

This book thinks it's a romance.
It is a romance in the sense that Gone With The Wind is a romance, except with less romance. Just one long love letter to colonialism and horrible white people.
It begins with a preface by the author talking about how exciting and romantic the history of colonialism in Indonesia is. It is written in 1947, and set in 1656 with rich white protagonists surrounded by slaves so you already know it's gonna be bad.
The protagonist is Annabet, an eighteen year old Dutch girl who long-distance-married Evert, a violent, volatile, slave-owning Dutch nutmeg plantation owner. He proceeds to be extremely horrible to her. Just relentlessly awful. Not even in a horrible romance novel way where he's a dick but then he stops being a dick because he falls in love. He cheerfully plots ways to humiliate her and crush her spirit as he waits for her arrival. I'm not reading into the text at all; that's his inner monologue. When she gets there, he tries to murder her for not being hot enough. He isolates her, yells at her, insults her, then eventually uses physical violence on her, and takes away everything she has including all her clothes and installs his mistress in her place. That's the state of their relationship at the end of the book, btw, it doesn't wrap up in a happily ever after. This is a pitch perfect description of an abusive relationship, and I don't know why people seem to interpret him as a love interest.
So, you're expecting the plot to be the other love interest falling in love with her and rescuing her from this garbage fire of a human being, right? Nope. Christy shows up literally once, a hundred pages into the book. He has a stab wound and Annabet halfheartedly takes care of him and gets a crush on him because he's the only hot man she's ever had unsupervised access to. She snuggles him a little while he's unconscious and when he wakes up he leaves, never to be seen again in the book. That bodice ripper cover kiss never happens. She just nurses a teenage crush on Christy, and by the end of the book decides she doesn't even care that much about him. Annabet just placidly fucks Evert and decides to resign herself to being a good wife to him even though she doesn't love him, and LITERALLY a couple pages after he murders a bunch of women and children by throwing them down a well thinks to herself that if she hadn't met the other leg of the love triangle she would probably be in love with Evert by now. She's the most passive, useless protagonist I've ever seen. She just lays around wearing expensive clothing, doing nothing and talking to nobody. Her one attempt to play mistress of the castle and help a woman who just gave birth ended in dismal failure, and she never tried doing anything useful ever again.
At the end of the book, Evert is dead after murdering a shit ton of brown people, and Annabet dies literally saving colonialism by murdering the Bandanese king who just staged a coup to reclaim his islands. Meanwhile, Christy continues living his life on some distant island somewhere, not knowing what a bullet he just dodged.
As far as I can tell, this seems to be a fantasy about being hot and rich and completely useless, and lording it over brown people. The most hilarious part of the book, in my opinion, is the end where Annabet is like "I have to save this island from this king! A native king will be way crueler to the locals than the East India Trading company and all the Dutch plantation owners here!" which uh [citation needed].
So, I don't recommend this book. To anyone. For any reason.

[Anna Marie]

I stumbled upon this vintage book at a thrift store and only purchased it because I thought the cover was beautiful. However, I was so pleasantly surprised when I read it. You could tell the author may have not had the most worldly understanding of what life and society was like in the far east but the story itself was compelling and well written. It had a little but of mysticism, romance, war, death, all the good stuff. Good read.

[Nancy]

I just finished the Silver Nutmeg by Norah Lofts. I was gob smacked! The background of the Spice Islands piqued my interest and I want to read more about the islands and their history. This gentle appearing author is simply amazing in her covering of history in all her novels with bloodshed, sexual tension, coming to terms with ethics, politics and the manners of the day. I so thoroughly enjoyed this book.

[Linda]

A woman torn between two men. At one time I read every book I found by Lofts.

[E Wilson]

I was thrilled to find a Norah Lofts book I hadn't read.

The story takes place in Banda, an island in the Dutch East Indies.
Evert is a rather pompous and shrewd owner of a nutmeg plantation.
He arranges a "glove marriage" to bring Annabet from Holland to be his wife. When they were children Annabet's family was rich and powerful.
Evert's family was poor and had a bad reputation. Now their fortunes
are reversed so Annabet's mother accepts the mail order bride agreement.

Annabet has suffered a serious illness and is thin and unattractive when she arrives in Banda. Evert makes no secret of his distaste and
feelings of being duped. After Annabet recovers her health and beauty he changes, but still treats her as a prize possession.

I didn't find either Evert or Annabet that likable, Evert for obvious reasons. I found Annabet to be somewhat of a ninny for falling in love with Christy , a man who stumbles into the house while Evert is gone and with whom she spends only a few hours. She stubbornly clings to this fantasy man even when Evert seems to be truly falling in love with her.

As the story progresses both Evert and Annabet gain depth and character. I started to like them more, so I wasn't very satisfied
with the ending.

[Terri Edwards]

Let me say that I love Norah Lofts, but I skipped ahead and skimmed the last few pages. I think it was the subject matter (colonial wars, nutmeg harvesting, shipping) that I couldn't get into. The story of Evert, Piet and Annabet was compelling though, so if you don't mind reading a good deal about all the other, I would recommend this. But I knew enough, by reading the last 10 pages or so, to know what had happened near the middle of the book and to be able to read to the end and know what was going on.

[ღ Carol jinx~☆~☔ʚϊɞ]

I just found this book and am excited to read another of Norah's that I have never read.

[Darinda]

A vintage read. Annabet travels to the Dutch East Indies to marry Evert, who lives on a nutmeg plantation. Evert is horrible to Annabet, and she falls for an Englishman. Not a happy book.

[Jean B.]

One thing I liked about this book was the description of the older woman who had been traumatized during an earlier slave revolt and her response to the beginning of the coup that happens during this book. I found the description of her emotional response to be informative and ahead of its time.
One thing I like about this website is that we can post our opinion about a book, whether we like it or not. One thing I don't like about this website is that some reviewers scold or shame other reviewers for having a different opinion from them.
That kind of response can make someone like me hesitate about posting my thoughts, but I'm going to post this anyway.

[Erin Winslow]

I read this book as a teenager back in the 1970's and I was appalled. The story is an abysmal glorification of colonialism. Then everyone dies.

[Franziska Self Fisken]

Read this decades ago, but remember I enjoyed it.

[Ruth]

c1947: FWFTB: Dutch, Indonesia, Spice, plantation, brothers. Norah Lofts, née Norah Ethel Robinson, (27 August 1904 – 10 September 1983) A brilliant author's note/apology The irresistible desire to write a book about the nutmeg island of Banda came upon me when I was reading H.W. Ponder’s book, In Javanese Waters. There, in one short chapter, was outlined a romantic, bloodstained history that called for exploration. But, like all exploration, it presented great difficulties. The Dutch East Indies were in Japanese hands, all contact broken; Banda itself is no more than a speck, the size of a fly dirt on the map; no book that came my way gave any idea of the island’s layout. So my geography is the geography of the imagination. . Not sure that it could be considered one of her better works but as she said the plot was the very last of the reasons to write this novel. Recommended to those who are already a fan of Nora Lofts.

[Jennifer Dodde]

Silver Nutmeg by Norah Lofts (1947)

[Lisa Hyatt]

I love Norah Lofts but the end of this book made me feel like burning it, normally a sacrilege to me. What a waste of time and energy. Bleh.

[Wynne]

A novel about a specific place and time