Embracing the social changes of 1970s Australia, against a backdrop of native fauna and flora, The Silent Kookaburra is a haunting exploration of the blessings, curses and tyranny of memory.
All eleven-year-old Tanya Randall wants is a happy family. But Mum does nothing besides housework, Dad’s always down the pub and Nanna Purvis moans at everyone except her dog. Then Shelley arrives –– the miracle baby who fuses the Randall family in love for their little gumnut blossom.
Tanya’s life gets even better when she meets an uncle she didn’t know she had. He tells her she’s beautiful and could be a model. Her family refuses to talk about him. But that’s okay, it’s their little secret.
Then one blistering summer day tragedy strikes, and the surrounding mystery and suspicion tear apart this fragile family web.
Embracing the social changes of 1970s Australia, against a backdrop of native fauna and flora, The Silent Kookaburra is a haunting exploration of the blessings, curses and tyranny of memory.
Available as E-book and paperback.
Reviews
Olga Núñez Miret, author/translator (English/Spanish), psychiatrist, book reviewer: … a must for lovers of historical and women’s fiction. Beautifully written, carefully
researched, and emotionally charged, the three books are connected by an amulet and the female legacy it represents … adventures of strong, brave, and determined women who will pull at your heartstrings.
Terry Tyler, author: An intricately researched and beautifully written series that artfully shows how the threads of the past link generations together.
Claire Whatley, reader, writer: For readers who love gripping, well-written, intelligent fiction. Three stand-alone stories linked by a bone angel talisman that is passed down to midwife women over generations of a single family. In each, a different female protagonist faces the challenges of the age – Black Death, French Revolution, World War II – as well as the challenges contained in every human life: love, loss, friendship, betrayal, tragedy and heart-rending choices.
C. P. Lesley, author of The Golden Lynx and other novels: Three compelling heroines linked by a bone angel with a mystical past–a French village struggling with revolution, world war, and Black Death. Follow Victoire, Céleste, and Héloïse as each undertakes a richly imagined, emotionally complex journey toward a definition of womanhood that is uniquely her own. This trilogy–on my list of Hidden Gems–is one not to be missed.
Josie Barton, Book Blogger at JaffaReadsToo: … grips your imagination from the very beginning and the momentum doesn’t stop until all the stories are completed.