Book picks similar to
The Black Dog Gang by Robert Newton


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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Macmillan Reader)


F.H. Cornish - 2007
    The classic story of a boy's adventures in the Mississippi Valley.

Bereft


Chris Womersley - 2010
    Quinn Walker returns from the Great War to the New South Wales town of Flint: the birthplace he fled ten years earlier when he was accused of a heinous act.A LIE UNFORGIVABLEAware of the townsmen's vow to hang him, Quinn takes to the surrounding hills. Here, deciding upon his plan of action, and questioning just what he has returned for, he meets Sadie Fox.A BOND UNBREAKABLEThis mysterious girl seems to know, and share, his darkest fear. And, as their bond greatens, Quinn learns what he must do to lay the ghosts of his past, and Sadie's present, to rest.

A Northern Light


Jennifer Donnelly - 2003
    Desperate for money, she takes a job at the Glenmore, where hotel guest Grace Brown entrusts her with the task of burning a secret bundle of letters. But when Grace's drowned body is fished from the lake, Mattie discovers that the letters could reveal the grim truth behind a murder.Set in 1906 against the backdrop of the murder that inspired Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy, Jennifer Donnelly's astonishing debut novel effortlessly weaves romance, history, and a murder mystery into something moving, and real, and wholly original.Includes a reader's guide and an interview with the author.

The Science of Appearances


Jacinta Halloran - 2016
    His logical mind draws him towards the pursuit of science and knowledge. Mary, who loves to draw, is passionate and impetuous. The small country town in which they live, in the aftermath of World War II, is not enough to contain her ambitions for life and for love.When Mary escapes to Melbourne in pursuit of sensuality and art, Dominic must shoulder the mantle of family responsibility. Mary begins a new life, exploring the bohemian haunts of a rapidly changing post-war city. Dominic studies hard and eventually finds himself drawn into the field of eugenics, a fraught pseudo-science based on ideology. Then he meets Hanna, the daughter of Jewish refugees, who begins to show him the limitations of his scientific view.But Dominic and Mary are destined to come together, and the past cannot be left behind so easily. When Dominic comes looking for his sister, Mary must decide where her loyalties lie: to her family or to her art.Dominic, meanwhile, bears a secret of his own.This is a powerful novel about the choices we make in pursuit of our ideas, and the inexorable pull of the past. Set in an era of social constraint but profound genetic discovery, The Science of Appearances examines how the complex interplay of heredity and environment makes, shapes, and sometimes breaks us.

The Silent Listener


Lyn Yeowart - 2021
    Cold dark secrets . . .In the cold, wet summer of 1960, 11-year-old Joy Henderson lives in constant fear of her father. She tries to make him happy but, as he keeps reminding her, she is nothing but a filthy sinner destined for Hell . . .Yet, decades later, she returns to the family’s farm to nurse him on his death bed. To her surprise, her ‘perfect’ sister Ruth is also there, whispering dark words, urging revenge.Then the day after their father finally confesses to a despicable crime, Joy finds him dead - with a belt pulled tight around his neck . . .For Senior Constable Alex Shepherd, investigating George’s murder revives memories of an unsolved case still haunting him since that strange summer of 1960: the disappearance of nine-year-old Wendy Boscombe.As seemingly impossible facts surface about the Hendersons – from the past and the present – Shepherd suspects that Joy is pulling him into an intricate web of lies and that Wendy’s disappearance is the key to the bizarre truth.

My Brilliant Career


Miles Franklin - 1901
    Sybylla rejects the opportunity to marry a wealthy young man in order to maintain her independence. As a consequence she must take a job as a governess to a local family to which her father is indebted. "My Brilliant Career" is an early romantic novel by this popular Australian author.

Bridge of Clay


Markus Zusak - 2018
    As the Dunbar boys love and fight and learn to reckon with the adult world, they discover the moving secret behind their father’s disappearance. At the center of the Dunbar family is Clay, a boy who will build a bridge—for his family, for his past, for greatness, for his sins, for a miracle. The question is, how far is Clay willing to go? And how much can he overcome?

Cissy Funk


Kim Taylor Blakemore - 2001
    It's an unforgiving background to the violence in Cissy Funk's life. She's alone on a scrap of a farm with her mother and brother, and her mother hasn't recovered from the death of Cissy's baby sister. She's turned cold, and mean, and she's turned against Cissy, singling her out, leaving bruises and a breaking heart. When Cissy's Aunt Vera turns up, with her warm hugs and pretty clothes, it looks like there just might be hope on the horizon after all. Vera is determined to make sure Cissy is safe and loved, despite her sister in law, despite the hard times, despite her own fears. But these hard times are more than failed crops and no work. There's a trouble in Cissy's family that no one is willing to tell her about, and it's threatening to bring her fragile happiness crashing down. When there's nothing but dirt, dust, and the faintest glimpse of delight, Cissy has to find the strength to grab onto what she can. Her family might not be what she thought it was, but maybe it can be exactly what she needs.

The Color of My Words


Lynn Joseph - 2000
    Américas Award Winner“An achingly beautiful story.”—Kirkus (starred review) “Eloquent.”—Booklist (starred review) “Lovely and lyrical.”—School Library JournalThis powerful and resonant Américas Award-winning novel tells the story of a young girl’s struggle to find her place in the world and to become a writer in a country where words are feared.Seamlessly interweaving both poetry and prose, Lynn Joseph’s acclaimed debut is a lush and lyrical journey into a landscape and culture of the Dominican Republic.The Color of My Words explores the pain and poetry of discovering what it means to be part of a family, what it takes to find your voice and the means for it to be heard, and how it feels to write it all down.

Fury


Shirley Marr - 2010
    Let me tell you my story.Not just the facts I know you want to hear.If I’m going to tell you my story,I’m telling it my way.Strap yourself in...Eliza Boans has everything.A big house.A great education.A bright future.So why is she sitting in a police station confessing to murder?

The Strays


Emily Bitto - 2014
    He and his wife are attempting to escape the stifling conservatism of 1930s Australia by inviting other like-minded artists to live and work with them at their family home. As Lily’s friendship with Eva grows, she becomes infatuated with this makeshift family and longs to truly be a part of it.Looking back on those years later in life, Lily realises that this utopian circle involved the same themes as Evan Trentham’s art: Faustian bargains and terrible recompense; spectacular fortunes and falls from grace. Yet it was not Evan, nor the other artists he gathered around him, but his own daughters, who paid the debt that was owing.The Strays is an engrossing story of ambition, sacrifice and compromised loyalties from an exciting new talent.

The Adventures of Robin Hood


Roger Lancelyn Green - 1956
    He takes refuge with his Merrie Men in the vast Sherwood Forest, emerging time and again to outwit his enemies with daring and panache. This book presents the story of social justice and cunning.

Elianne


Judy Nunn - 2013
    Rock ‘n' roll, the Pill, the Vietnam War, the rise of Feminism, Asian immigration and the Freedom Ride join forces to rattle the chains of traditional values.The workers leave the great sugar estates as mechanisation lessens the need for labour. And the Durham family, its secrets exposed, begins its fall from grace...

Uprising


Margaret Peterson Haddix - 2007
    She herself was sobbing tearlessly....Her only prayer was still, "I don't want to die." Oh, please, God, don't let me die, she thought. I've never even had a chance to live.Bella, newly arrived in New York from Italy, gets a job at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. There, along with hundreds of other immigrants, she works long hours at a grueling job under terrible conditions. Yetta, a coworker from Russia, has been crusading for a union, and when factory conditions worsen, she helps workers rise up in a strike. Wealthy Jane learns of the plight of the workers and becomes involved with their cause. Bella and Yetta are at work--and Jane is visiting the factory--on March 25, 1911, when a spark ignites some cloth and the building is engulfed in fire, leading to one of the worst workplace disasters ever. Margaret Peterson Haddix draws on extensive historical research to bring the tragedy of the Triangle Shirtwaist fire to tangible life through her thrilling story of Bella, Yetta, and Jane.

Someone Like Me


Elaine Forrestal - 1996
    They have come to Australia to escape the violence in Northern Ireland, but when the past catches up with them, Tas is trapped in the middle.