Fiction > Australian

This book contains a collection of nature poems and art work, lovingly designed and crafted by Melbourne-based artist, Bee Williamson. The work huddles around her love of Nature, where she finds peace, joy and the inspiration to write and draw, deep within the source and solace of nature's gentle hand. Her grandfather, acclaimed nature writer Henry Williamson, encouraged Bee, through his undeniable spiritual presence, to reveal her deep expresison and concerns within this work, her second ublished book, "Nature - a gift". The simpl... read more

At a suburban barbecue, a man slaps a child who is not his own. This event has a shocking ricochet effect on a group of people, mostly friends, who are directly or indirectly influenced by the event.
In this remarkable novel, Christos Tsiolkas turns his unflinching and all-seeing eye onto that which connects us all: the modern family and domestic life in the twenty-first century. The Slap is told from the points of view of eight people who were present at the barbecue. The slap and its consequences force them all to question ... read more

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Big-hearted, moving and richly rewarding, That Deadman Dance is set in the first decades of the 19th century in the area around what is now Albany, Western Australia. In playful, musical prose, the book explores the early contact between the Aboriginal Noongar people and the first European settlers. The novel's hero is a young Noongar man named Bobby Wabalanginy. Clever, resourceful and eager to please, Bobby befriends the new arrivals, joining them hunting whales, tilling the land, exploring the hinterland and establishing the fle... read more

Following a childhood marked by poverty and petty crime in the slums of London, William Thornhill is sentenced in 1806 to be transported to New South Wales for the term of his natural life. With his wife and children, he arrives in a harsh land to a life that feels like a death sentence. But among the convicts there is a whisper that freedom can be bought - an opportunity to start afresh on lush, 'unclaimed' land away from the infant township of Sydney, up the Hawkesbury River. As Thornhill and his family stake their claim on a pat... read more

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When Jimmie Blacksmith marries a white woman the backlash from both Jimmie's tribe and white society initiates a series of dramatic events. As Jimmie tries to survive between two cultures, tensions build reaching a head when the Newbys, Jimmie's white employers, try to break up his marriage. The Newby women are murdered and Jimmie flees, pursued by police and vigilantes. The hunt intensifies as further murders are committed and concludes with tragic results. Thomas Keneally's fictionalised account of the 19th century Aboriginal, Ji... read more

This modern Australian classic is an epic novel of love and acceptance - a celebration of people, places and rhythms which has fuelled imaginations world-wide. Winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award and the National Book Council's Banjo Award for fiction. 2004-2005 HSC Advanced English prescribed text.

'Let me burst your city bubble for you. This is the Pilbara. And it's the Pilbara that makes the rules'. Lena Todd is a city girl who thrives on cocktails and cappuccinos. So when her boss announces he's sending her to the outback to join a construction team, her world is turned upside down. Lena's new accommodation will be an aluminium box called a dongar. Her new social network: three hundred and fifty men. Her daily foot attire: steel-capped boots. Unfortunately, Lena can't refuse. Mistakes of the past are choking her confid... read more

Fearing for their lives after the sudden death of their mother, Adela and Klara must flee Prague to find refuge with their uncle in Australia. Adela becomes a film director at a time when the local industry is feeling the competition from Hollywood. While success is imminent, the issues of family and love are never far away.

Myrtle Dunnage returns to Dungatar, a small country town where the townspeoples' eccentricities are many and varied. At first, ostracisedTilly is gradually accepted in order to make use of her extraordinary dressmaking skills. But ghosts of the past have to be faced, and Tilly wreaks a havoc that provides a most satisfying

This collection of prize-winning short stories opens up worlds of small, finely observed detail, which resonate in the reader's mind long after the story is finished. From the awkward strain of dissolving relationships to the revealing vagaries of chance occurrences upon ordinary people, the voices that inhabit these worlds speak eloquently of the hidden motivations that propel us all to act. Often without realising it, these characters hold in their hands both the consequences of small decisions and - sometimes - the power of life and death.

After a terrible argument with her father over their family property, Waters Meeting, Rebecca Suanders throws her swag in the ute and heads north with her three dogs. A job as a jillaroo takes her into the rowdy world of B&S balls, Bundy rum and boys. It's only when tragedy shatters her world that Rebecca finds inner strength and courage.

Rosie Highgrove-Jones grows up hating her double barrelled name. She dreams of riding over the plains on the family property. Instead she's stuck writing the social pages of the local paper. Then a tragedy sparks a series of shocking revelations for Rosie and her family.

Winner of the 2002 Miles Franklin Literary Award; the 2002 WA Premier’s Award - Book of the Year; the WA Premier’s Award for Fiction; the 2002 Christina Stead Award, NSW Premier’s Literary Award; the 2001 goodreading Award - Readers Choice Book of the Year; the 2001 Book Data/ABA Book of the Year.Georgie Jutland is a mess. At forty, with her career in ruins, she finds herself stranded in White Point with a fisherman she doesn’t love and two kids whose dead mother she can never replace. Her days have fallen into domestic tedium ... read more

She felt it still, the struggle in the dark, as though it continued several layers down. She could not remember if, before the wreck, nights had been such a terror to heran epic, tearing battle against waves of darkness and oblivion from which she seemed to surface, gasping, before being pulled back down by exhaustion.A ship is wrecked in 1887 near the small country town of Colego. The sea throws up one troubled survivor who claims to know only her name. Glenys Osborne's compelling first novel traces the impact of the loss of the L... read more

Daniel Rooke, soldier and astronomer, was always an outsider. As a young lieutenant of marines he arrives in New South Wales on the First Fleet in 1788 and sees his chance. He sets up his observatory away from the main camp, and begins the scientific work that he hopes will make him famous. Aboriginal people soon start to visit his isolated promontory, and a child named Tagaran begins to teach him her language. With meticulous care he records their conversations. An extraordinary friendship forms, and Rooke has almost forgotten he ... read more

Claire Sellwyn-Wallace has decided to throw her ovaries a farewell party - one wild night of unbridled lust before she says goodbye to all that. This time it will be everything she has always imagined. This time she knows exactly how it will go. She's old enough, she's earned it. But can you plan passion? And what's love got to do with it? A warm, funny and sexy novel about life, eternity, hormones and hair removal.

Marie King is fifty-nine, recently divorced, and has lived a rather conventional life on Sydney's affluent north shore. Now her three children have moved out, the family home is to be sold, and with it will go her beloved garden. On a drunken whim, Marie gets a tattoo - an act that gives way to an unexpected friendship with her tattoo artist, Rhys. Before long, Rhys has introduced Marie to a side of the city that clashes with her staid north-shore milieu. Her children are mortified by their mother's transformation, but have their o... read more

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