Marama plot
The story unfolds on the grim moors of North Yorkshire in 1859, where the British Empire casts long and distorted shadows. Mary Stevens, a young Māori teacher from Aotearoa (New Zealand), arrives seeking the truth about her family, only to discover that the man who summoned her is already dead and there is no clear path home. Stranded in an unfamiliar and inhospitable land, Mary takes a job at Hawkser Manor under the seemingly benevolent Sir Nathaniel Cole, a wealthy landowner who made his fortune as a whaling ship in the South Pacific.