Murdering Stepmothers: The Execution of Martha Rendell.

• Jurisdiction: Australia
• Author: Worrall, Anne
• Date: 01 August 2010

Murdering Stepmothers: The Execution of Martha Rendell

By Anna Haebich

Perth: University of Western Australia Publishing, 2010

Martha Rendell was the last woman to be executed in Western Australia. She was hanged in 1909 for the murder of her stepson (and the suspected murder of two other stepchildren). A plaque at the Old Fremantle Prison Museum announces 'Martha Rendell was a stepmother and was callous and cruel to her stepchildren' (p.

155). Anna Haebich's novel is based on this historical event but is written through the lens of 21st century feminist and criminological scholarship. The story is told by five separate ('unreliable') narrators: the photographer from the sensationalist local newspaper, The Truth; the detective in charge of the murder investigation; a retired local doctor who followed the case through its trial; the Methodist minister who was Martha's spiritual adviser and public champion; and, finally, the researcher. Apart from the researcher (Haebich herself), each of these characters 'grew out of [the author's] imaginative responses to the scanty archival records' (p. 203) available in the State Library and State Records Office of Western Australia in Perth. These were supplemented by the author's wider reading and experiences of living in Perth.

Methodologically, the book is innovative. The author, a research professor at the Centre for Public Culture and Ideas at Griffith University, Brisbane, combines not only fact and fiction (as do...