When his fiancé breaks off their engagement, Patrick Oxtoby leaves home and moves into a boarding house in a remote seaside town. But in spite of his hopes and determination to build a better life, nothing goes to plan and Patrick is soon driven ...

A powerful debut from an Australian novelist that features one of the most likeable but contrary figures you are likely to meet in contemporary fiction. Lou Connor, a gifted, unhappy sixteen-year-old, is desperate to escape her life of poverty in ...

Ireland, 1971, John Egan is a misfit, 'a twelve year old in the body of a grown man with the voice of a giant who insists on the ridiculous truth'. With an obsession for the Guinness Book of Records and faith in his ability to detect when adults a...

When his fiancée breaks off their engagement, Patrick Oxtoby moves away to a boarding house in a seaside town. But in spite of his hopes and determination to build a better life, nothing goes to plan and Patrick is soon driven to take a desperate...

John Egan lives with his mother, father and grandmother in rural Ireland. This twelve year-old boy believes he has a unique talent and dreams of becoming a world-famous lie-detector, at almost any cost to himself and his family. In this singular t...