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Michael’s older brother dies at the beginning of the summer he turns 15, but as its title suggestsThe Incredible Here and Now is a tale of wonder, not of tragedy. Presented as a series of vignettes, in the tradition of Sandra Cisneros’ Young Adult classic The House on Mango Street, it tells of Michael’s coming of age in a year which brings him grief and romance; and of the place he lives in Western Sydney where ‘those who don’t know any better drive through the neighbourhood and lock their car doors’, and those who do, flourish in its mix of cultures. Through his perceptions, the reader becomes familiar with Michael’s community and its surroundings, the unsettled life of his family, the girl he meets at the local pool, the friends that gather in the McDonalds parking lot at night, the white Pontiac Trans Am that lights up his life like a magical talisman.
Both a gripping family drama and a timely meditation on borders, the media, and immigration, No More Boats tells a universal story about fitting in and feeling threatened. Set in Sydney's working-class western suburbs, No More Boats is a vivid portrait of a family whose unraveling collides with a crisis known as the " Tampa affair," when over four hundred refugees were left stranded fifteen miles off the Australian coast as debate over their legitimate entry into the country raged. Antonio, a recently unemployed Italian immigrant, awkwardly assumes a starring role in the fracas, and drags into the spotlight his wife Rose, who has a rich back story of her own, and their two children, Nico and Claire, who are both drifting. Manipulated by the media and made vulnerable by his feelings of irrelevance, Antonio commits an act that makes him a lightning rod for the factions at odds over the Tampa affair. No More Boats is an unbiased, moving, original, and important story about the world we live in, the families we come from, and the raw impulses that we attempt to conceal.
A complicated friendship. A roadtrip in a stolen car. The stories that define us. And two funny, sharp, adventurous young women who refuse to be held back any longer. Rosa was never really trying to hurt anyone, no matter what they said in court. But she's ended up in juvenile jail anyway, living her life through books and wondering why her best mate Asheeka disappeared. A page-turning novel about a complicated friendship; a road trip through NSW in a stolen car; the stories that define us; and two funny, sharp, adventurous young women who refuse to be held back any longer. WINNER OF THE VICTORIAN PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARD FOR WRITING FOR YOUNG ADULTS 2022 SHORTLISTED FOR THE CBCA BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR OLDER READERS 2022 SHORTLISTED FOR THE NSW PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARDS THE ETHEL TURNER PRIZE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE'S LITERATURE 2022 SHORTLISTED FOR THE QUEENSLAND LITERARY AWARDS 2022 YOUNG ADULT BOOK AWARD
A traveller becomes a Monroe impersonator in the casinos of Macau. An obsessive son of Australians living in Jakarta confronts his strange rituals. A young woman is trapped in the boredom of her fathers' ministry in exotic Borneo. A daughter defies her mother and travels to Bali. Castagna's twenty stories range across countries: including Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and China, deftly exploring the relationships of parents and children, lovers and enemies, the transient and the resident. In the spirit of Rattawatt Lapacharoensap's Sightseeing, Castagna's fiction powerfully captures the landscapes and cultures of Asia and the intriguing interactions of Westerners with it.
Just as authors create books, books create authors — and these essays by thirty-one writers for young people offer a fascinating glimpse at the books that inspired them the most. What if you could look inside your favorite authors’ heads and see the book that led them to become who they are today? What was the book that made them fall in love, or made them understand something for the first time? What was the book that made them feel challenged in ways they never knew they could be, emotionally, intellectually, or politically? What book made them readers, or made them writers, or made them laugh, think, or cry? Join thirty-one top children’s and young adult authors as they explore the books, stories, and experiences that changed them as readers — for good. Some of the contributors include: Ambelin Kwaymullina Mal Peet Shaun Tan Markus Zusak Randa Abdel-Fattah Alison Croggon Ursula Dubosarsky Simon French Jaclyn Moriarty
A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year A Chicago Public Library Best of the Best of the Year "Profoundly moving . . . Will take your breath away." —Kathleen Glasgow, author of Girl in Pieces A stunningly gorgeous and deeply hopeful portrayal of living with mental illness and grief, from an exceptional new voice. Biz knows how to float. She has her people, her posse, her mom and the twins. She has Grace. And she has her dad, who tells her about the little kid she was, and who shouldn't be here but is. So Biz doesn't tell anyone anything. Not about her dark, runaway thoughts, not about kissing Grace or noticing Jasper, the new boy. And she doesn't tell anyone about her dad. Because her dad d...
"Beginning with Felicity Castagna's warning about the dangers of cultural labelling, this collection of essays takes resistance against conformity and uncritical consensus as one of its central themes. From Aleesha Paz's call to recognise the revolutionary act of public knitting, to Sheila Ngoc Pham on the importance of education in crossing social and ethnic boundaries, to May Ngo's cosmopolitan take on the significance of the shopping mall, the collection offers complex and humane insights into the dynamic relationships between class, culture, family, and love. Eda Gunaydin's 'Second City', from which this collection takes its title, is both a political autobiography and an elegy for a Par...
Age range 14+ Meet Tariq Nader, leader of ‘The Wolf Pack’ at Punchbowl High, who has been commanded by the new principal to join a football competition with his mates in order to rehabilitate the public image of their school. When the team is formed, Tariq learns there’s a major catch – half of the team is made up of white boys from Cronulla, aka enemy territory – and he must compete with their strongest player for captaincy of the team. At school Tariq thinks he has life all figured out until he falls for a new girl called Jamila, who challenges everything he thought he knew. At home, his outspoken ways have brought him into conflict with his family. Now, with complications on all...
'You look the type to break your father’s heart.' 'Yeah, but he broke mine first.’ When Rosie Gennaro first meets Jimmy Hailler, she has walked away from life in Sydney, leaving behind the place on Dalhousie that her father, Seb, painstakingly rebuilt for his family but never saw completed. Two years later, Rosie returns to the house and living there is Martha, whom Seb Gennaro married less than a year after the death of Rosie’s mother. Martha is struggling to fulfil Seb’s dream, while Rosie is coming to terms with new responsibilities. And so begins a stand-off between two women who refuse to move out of the home they both lay claim to. As the battle lines are drawn, Jimmy Hailler re-enters Rosie’s life. Having always watched other families from the perimeters, he’s now grappling, heartbreakingly, with forming one of his own . . . An unforgettable story about losing love and finding love; about the interconnectedness of lives and the true nature of belonging, from one of our most acclaimed writers.
For a long time Western Sydney has been the political flash-point of the nation, but it has been absent from Australian literature. Luke Carman's first book of fiction is about to change all that: a collection of monologues and stories which tells it how it is on Australia's cultural frontier. His young, self-conscious but determined hero na...