Bella's Run in Aussie Readers

Feb 07, 2012 Bree T rated it really liked it

Shelves: arc, australian, romance, women-s-fiction, aww2012, rural-lit

Bella Vermaelon is in her early twenties, a farm girl who grew up on a dairy farm deep in the Gippsland area in south east Victoria. She and her best friend Patty, also a farm girl but trained as a nurse are taking a year off from their respective jobs and travelling around Australia, working and sightseeing. They’ve worked cattle and grain farms in outback Queensland and traveled down the east coast of Australia, inland to Tamworth for the country music festival and now it’s time to go home. Ev Bella Vermaelon is in her early twenties, a farm girl who grew up on a dairy farm deep in the Gippsland area in south east Victoria. She and her best friend Patty, also a farm girl but trained as a nurse are taking a year off from their respective jobs and travelling around Australia, working and sightseeing. They’ve worked cattle and grain farms in outback Queensland and traveled down the east coast of Australia, inland to Tamworth for the country music festival and now it’s time to go home. Everywhere they’ve been they’ve made friends (and an enemy or two) and partied and had a fantastic time. But as amazing as the adventure as all been, the girls are getting a bit homesick. They have a couple of reasons for wanting to be home – both have begun tentative relationships during their travels, Bella with Patty’s older brother Will and Patty with Bella’s cousin Macca. Everything has been perfect and Bella is deeply happy, until something terrible happens that ultimate shatters her whole world. Recovering from serious injury, she turns to the one person she thought would share and support her in her time of grief as they are grieving too – only to be rejected. Heartbroken, she leaves behind the beautiful land she loves so much for a new life in the city. But Bella is about to find out that you can’t ignore who you truly are forever – or who you truly love.

I was offered the chance to read and review Bella’s Run and jumped at it. Rural lit is gaining in popularity in recent times and there’s a slew of up coming titles due to be published soon. I think it appeals to a lot of people who dream of living on the land (but perhaps without the huge amounts of work and debt that often come with it) and this is a way to live vicariously. There’s something utterly intriguing about the idea of owning a huge spread!

Bella’s Run opens with a bang, a mysterious incident and then we go back in time a bit to when Bella and her best friend Patty were at work on a huge cattle property in Queensland. Their characters are quickly established – both are young, fun-loving, a bit wild, always up for an adventure or a good time. There’s quite a bit of drinking in this book – in fact it took me right back to my first two years at University which was a former agricultural college still running those degrees. We got a lot of rural students studying ag, equine, etc (I was doing an Environmental Management degree) and the amount of drinking some of them could do was insane. There are times when I felt queasy just reading about the drinking Bella and Patty were doing (mostly just the time they had a shot competition. Shots and I do not go well together!) They were very obviously two girls that really enjoyed life and all it had to offer them, whether it be mustering on a remote property in central outback Queensland or whooping it up at a Bachelor and Spinsters (B&S) Ball. They drive utes, they crack stockwhips, they ride horses, they love their country music. They were the sorts of girls you’d probably love being friends with because you’d know you’d have a good time whenever you hooked up with them!

Just as you settle in to the fun, the book takes a dramatic turn when a devastating event happens. The tone changes, Bella changes (her appearance and also her character) as she ends up in Melbourne working, far from her parents beloved farm. Just as Margareta Osborn captured Bella’s spirit in the first part of the novel, her vibrancy and confidence, after the tragedy, her soul-destroying grief is also expertly portrayed. Bella loses not only one person that was crucial to her world, but two in short succession and she changes. She becomes almost a shadow of her former self, but portraying a false confidence and image as she seeks to mend herself from the pain. Even after many years there are raw open wounds, when events conspire to lure her back to the rural areas she loves so much. And once she’s there, it’s like she can’t help but be free again, to be that person she was when she was younger.

Bella’s Run is more than just a story about a young girl who heads off on an adventure – it’s a story of love, amazing friendship and a deep passion for the land. A highly enjoyable debut novel that takes the reader on a wild ride from remote properties to road trips down the east coast to beautiful, quiet farmlands deep in the Gippsland (south east) area of Victoria. Bella is a likable main character, young and loving life and her freedom. Her evolution as a character over the course of the novel as she suffers heartbreak more than once and picks herself up and gets on with her life, coming out the other side stronger is very well crafted. ...more

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Dec 20, 2011 Shelleyrae at Book'd Out rated it really liked it

Shelves: aussie-author, arc-are

At it's heart, Bella's Run is a contemporary romance but it is also a wonderful story set against the rugged Victorian highlands. Osborn captures the spirit of the people who call the land 'home' with warmth and humour.

Bella and Patty are two capable, fun loving young women, enjoying a year traveling and working in the Queensland outback, but happy to return home when it comes to an end, especially with Will and Macca waiting for them. Osborn paints a delightful picture of these high spirited be At it's heart, Bella's Run is a contemporary romance but it is also a wonderful story set against the rugged Victorian highlands. Osborn captures the spirit of the people who call the land 'home' with warmth and humour.

Bella and Patty are two capable, fun loving young women, enjoying a year traveling and working in the Queensland outback, but happy to return home when it comes to an end, especially with Will and Macca waiting for them. Osborn paints a delightful picture of these high spirited best friends, dancing with the tumbleweeds, sinking Cock-Sucking Cowboys (liquor shots with equal parts Bailey's Irish Cream and Butterscotch Schnapps), and handling stockman whips with ease. I particularly enjoyed how Osborn wasn't tempted to stick with the more wholesome stereotype of rosy cheeked, demure country folk, the author has created genuine and roundly developed protagonists who are smart and confident. Bella and Patty, as well as their friends, work hard and play even harder on the rare occasions that they get the chance.
When tragedy strikes, it is all the more shocking that such vitality can be ended so abruptly. The novel's prologue (not a device I like, I must admit) tells of the devastation to come that changes the course of Bella's life, driving her from the land, and man, she loves.
The attraction between Will, Patty's brother, and Bella is a surprise to both of them. Sparked during a brief visit while the girls were still working in Queensland, the night of the Muster proves to them both that something special is happening between them. However the fledgling relationship is stunted by their tragic loss and the two are separated by their pain and guilt. In the years since, both have moved on, but Bella's return to Tindarra makes it clear that the two still have strong (and lusty) feelings for each other. Bella's Run is a romance, so while the road to happily ever after is complicated, in this instance by a manipulative ex-wife, a persistent fiance, an unplanned pregnancy and the general stubbornness of the pair, Will and Bella's relationship is dramatically resolved.

This debut novel proves Margareta Osborn a wonderful storyteller whose exuberant passion for rural Australia is evident on every page. Bella's Run is a delightful and engaging read that I very much enjoyed. I especially love the authenticity that the author brings to the story and her characters and I am looking forward to her second book due out in 2013.

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Jan 13, 2012 Brenda rated it really liked it

I received a copy of this book from the publisher, through my work. Once read, I will pass it on to others from work who also love to read:)

When best friends Bella and Patty decide to take a year off from their jobs in rural Victoria, they head for Queensland, for an outback trip of a lifetime! Along the way they mustered on cattle stations, cooked for weary stockmen and laughed, danced and played hard all the time.
They had a wonderful year, and in the last weeks, when Patty’s brother, Will, an ...more

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Oct 31, 2012 Nicola Marsh rated it it was amazing

Shelves: women-s-fiction, romances-read-2012, aussie-authors, read-in-2012

It has been too long since I've read any rural-lit. I love Rachel Treasure's books but has been years since I've read one.

Then I picked up Bella's Run this week and was hooked all over again.

It's a cracking book filled with real characters and real emotion.

It's poignant, romantic and funny, seamlessly weaving rural Australia and its lifestyle into an emotional story.

I loved it! ...more

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