Days of Innocence and Wonder

WINNER OF THE BARBARA JEFFERIS AWARD 2024
SHORTLISTED FOR THE NSW LITERARY AWARDS CHRISTINA STEAD PRIZE FOR FICTION 2025

When someone is taken away, what is left behind?

All her life, Till has lived in the shadow of the abduction of a childhood friend and her tormented wondering about whether she could have stopped it.

When Till, now twenty-three, senses danger approaching again, she flees her past and the hovering presence of her fearful parents. In Wirowie, a town on its knees, she stops and slowly begins creating a new life and home. But there is something menacing here too. Till must decide whether she can finally face down, even pursue, the darkness - or whether she'll flee once more and never stop running.

Both a reckoning with fear and loss, and a recognition of the power of belonging, Days of Innocence and Wonder is a richly textured, deeply felt new novel from one of Australia's finest writers.

Praise for Days of Innocence and Wonder

'Not a wasted word, not an observation missed' Jock Serong

'in full possession of her powers, as assured and ambitious as Barbara Kingsolver or Isabel Allende' Australian Book Review