This sweeping historical novel covers the lives of the villagers of Tolpuddle, in Dorset, in the early 1830s when infamously six farm labourers were transported to Australia after a show trial for swearing an oath to become members of a union of farm workers (that was not itself illegal by that time), to protest against the gradual reduction of farm labourers' wages that was threatening them and their families with hardship and near starvation. None of the six is a major character in the novel though, and the lives and loves of the fictional characters weave a web that gives a strong feeling for the texture of life in this society at this particular time, the poverty, sense of community and strong religious, especially Methodist, underpinning to life, that underlay the concerns for social justice. The main characters are young Wesley Gillam, and the girl he comes to love, Saranna Vey, though the eponymous woman is Amelia Cake, a cantankerous but ultimately compassionate widowed landowner for whom Wesley and Saranna work. A good read, and I would read more by this author - I understand that many of his novels are set in Cornwall, a part of the country I love. ( )