The Multiple Effects Of Rainshadow


Thea Astley - 1996
    Is he evil? Or crazy? His violence is in fact a mirror for the brutality of Australian life - and is a dim reflection at that, in a country where atrocities by whites against blacks are so ingrained few question them.The effects of the rampage ripple out from the island to link the fates of those who witnessed it, across the north and down through the decades. It is a time when silence in the face of tyranny is at its loudest. When allegiance to English niceties is confounded by the landscape and by the weather. And change is a slow wind that brings little real difference.

The Call of the High Country


Tony Parsons - 1999
    As a young married couple, Andrew and Anne work together to make the very best of their property, High Peaks, but at what cost to their happiness? In time, the property will pass to their son, David. Handsome and hardworking, David is determined to become the best sheepdog handler in the land. Nothing is going to stand in his way-not even the beautiful Catriona Campbell, daughter of the wealthy graziers next door. The Call Of The High Country is an inspiring and heartwarming saga of a family battling through hard times, of a love that defies all odds, and of dreams that won't be broken.

The Last Will and Testament of Henry Hoffman


John Tesarsch - 2015
    Afterwards, hisdaughter Eleanor discovers a will, in which he has left his entireestate to a woman she has never heard of before. Hiding it fromher siblings, she sets out to solve this mystery, and to unearth theconfronting truth about her reclusive father’s past.But Henry isn’t the only Hoffman with secrets. In the months thatfollow, his children learn things about each other they could neverpreviously have imagined.The Last Will and Testament of Henry Hoffman is a gripping andmany-layered story of love and loss, conflict and survival. Itexplores subjects that affect us all: guilt and redemption, theinescapability of the past, and how trauma resonates acrossgenerations.

The Lost Boys


Sam de Brito - 2008
    He and his friends while away their days smoking dope, trying to root chicks and surfing at Maroubra. Ned's life is only just beginning – tomorrow, some time.Ned is 35. He and his mates drift through the days snorting cocaine, trying to root chicks, clinging to the pub and surfing at Bondi. For Ned, this is it – tomorrow never came.What happens when life passes you by? When the drugs no longer work and the promise of the future has become the wreckage of the past? What happens when a generation of men lose their way?Confrontingly honest, blackly funny, The Lost Boys is a compelling look at the dark side of being a 21st century man from a powerful new voice in fiction.

Land of Golden Wattle


J.H. Fletcher - 2017
    Faced with the prospect of being forced into marriage with a man she detests, she enlists the help of her true love, Ephraim Dark,who assists her to escape to faraway Van Diemen’s Land. Here she seeks sanctuary with her wealthy uncle Barnsley Tregellas.1982, TasmaniaThe union of Bec Hampton and Jonathan, heir to the fabulously wealthy Penrose estate, brought promise of reconciliation to two warring sides of the same family: a dynasty that had its foundations laid by Emma Tregellas and Ephraim Dark nearly a hundred years earlier. Defying opposition from Jonathan’s formidable grandmother, Bec had gained control of Derwent, the agricultural empire that the family had built from the early days of white settlement. Now 85, Bec’s dearest wish is that her granddaughter Tamara should inherit the property but Giles, her dissolute son, has other ideas. Will Bec and Tamara succeed in defeating Giles’s plans or will control of Derwent pass irrevocably out of the family?This majestic historical drama spans seven generations of an often-divided Australian family. With them we experience many of the traumatic events of Australia’s history: the early days of white settlement, the gold rush, the cataclysm of two world wars and the great depression.

A Stairway to Paradise


Madeleine St. John - 1999
    There's Alex, miserable in his cold and calmly professional marriage, unable to leave because of his two children. Next comes Andrew, recently home from ten years in America, leaving an ex-wife and a beloved daughter on the other side of the world. And finally there's Barbara, the enchanting and lustrous object of their affections, formally self-possessed but strangely aimless and unfulfilled.With elegance and acuity, Madeleine St John chronicles their progress through numerous false starts, reversals, and misapprehensions. The result is a deeper understanding of longing and its significant companion -- loss.

A Man You Can Bank On


Derek Hansen - 2011
    This former bank manager helped them transform three million dollars - stolen from bookies by a gang of robbers - into a rescue package for their dying town.But now the day of reckoning has come.The crims want the money.The cops want the money.A rogue insurance investigator wants the money.And so do Australia's two most notorious hit men.In trying to save his town, Lambert is forced to risk everything - his life, the lives of the town folk, his own daughter, ten thousand barramundi and a really lovable Jack Russell.

Locust Summer


David Allan-Petale - 2021
    Rowan’s brother Albert, the natural heir to the farm, has died and Rowan’s dad’s health is failing. Although he longs to, there is no way that Rowan can refuse his mother’s request as she prepares the farm for sale.This is the story of the final harvest – the story of a young man in a place he doesn’t want to be, being given one last chance to make peace before the past, and those he has loved, disappear.

Inheritance


Kate Loveday - 2007
    What does she know about running cattle? But the property has been in her family for generations, and Cassie is not a quitter. She leaves behind her Sydney life and heads to the station, determined to make a go of it. But a long drought and falling prices mean challenges Cassie doesn’t expect. To save her heritage, she’s going to have to come up with some new ideas — and fast. Then the threatening letters start to arrive. Someone doesn’t want Cassie to succeed, and they’re willing to go to any lengths to stop her...

Wife For Hire


Dianne Blacklock - 2003
    She would marry a man called Tod or Brad and she would have two perfect children. But instead she married a Jeff and he’s just confessed to having an affair.Spurred on by supportive friends and her unpredictable sister Max, she finds the job she was born for: Wife for Hire. Sam manages everything from domestic help to renovations to social events for many satisfied customers.However when Hal Buchanan is added to her client list but claims not to need her services, Sam realises that while she can organise many things in life, she is not so businesslike when her emotions are involved.

Iron House Station: A father's love runs deep...


Kelly Cameron - 2020
    

Champagne for Breakfast


Maggie Christensen - 2017
    By the river. On her own.After finishing her six-year long affair with her boss, Rosa is desperate to avoid him in the workplace and determined to forge a new life for herself.Harry Kennedy has sailed away from a messy Sydney divorce and is resolute in kick-starting a new life on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast.Thrown together at work, Rosa and Harry discover a secret. One that their employer is desperate to keep hidden. To reveal it they must work together, but first they must learn to trust not only each other but their own rising attraction.Are these two damaged people willing to risk their hard won independence for the promise of love again?

Blessed: The Breakout Year of Rampaging Roy Slaven


John Doyle - 2021
    Whether it was riding Rooting King to another Melbourne Cup victory, commentating the Olympics or hobnobbing with the country's upper crust, Rampaging Roy Slaven has lived an extraordinary life.But even some of the greatest men come from humble beginnings. Before he shot to fame as Australia's most talented sportsman, he was just another kid in Lithgow, trying to avoid Brother Connell's strap and garner the attention of Susan Morgan from the local Catholic girls school.Blessed follows one year in the life of the boy who would become Rampaging Roy Slaven, a boy who, even at the age of fifteen, knew he was destined for greatness but had to get through high school first.

Unsolved Australia


Justine Ford - 2015
    Along the way you'll meet the 'Unsolved Squad' - the humble heroes and dedicated experts involved in collecting and connecting clues. Unsolved Australia is a chilling, thrilling and inspiring book full of drama, emotion... and hope.

The War Artist


Simon Cleary - 2019
    An encounter with young Sydney tattoo artist Kira leaves him with a permanent tribute to the soldier, but it is a meeting that will change the course of his life. What he isn’t expecting is a campaign of retribution from the soldiers who blame him for the ambush and threaten his career. With his marriage also on the brink, his life spirals out of control. Years later, Phelan is surprised when Kira re-enters his life seeking refuge from her own troubles and with a young son in tow. She finds a way to help him make peace with his past, but she is still on the run from her own. The War Artist is a timely and compelling novel about the legacy of war, the power of art and the possibility of redemption.