CROW COUNTRY

A contemporary time-slip fantasy drawing on Indigenous mythology, set in a vividly Australian landscape, with the lasting appeal of Ruth Park's Playing Beatie Bow.

Sadie has recently moved back to her mother's home town in country Victoria. She finds herself drawn to the dried-up lake where eerie carved standing stones have recently been revealed. The wheeling crows seem to speak to her about an old wrong she must set right, and she finds herself catapulted back to a time just after World War I. Three young men have just returned from the war: Sadie's grandfather who runs the local shop; the local landowner; and Jimmy Raven, an Indigenous stockman who works on the landowner's farm. Sadie discovers that Jimmy was killed under mysterious circumstances and that her grandfather helped cover it up. Back in her own time, Sadie befriends Walter, a boy from Mildura who may have a connection to Jimmy. Can Sadie and Walter work through the mystery and prevent a similar tragedy happening in their own time? Kate Constable's first books were The Singer of All Songs, The Waterless Sea and The Tenth Power form the 'Chanters of Tremaris' series. They were published by Allen & Unwin with very successful overseas sales, followed by a stand-alone novel set in the same world, The Taste of Lightning. She has also written a junior fiction book, Cicada Summer, as well as two books for the popular 'Girlfriend Fiction' series - Always Mackenzie and Winter of Grace. Solid sales for all her books reflect an author that has a keen readership.