PILGRIMAGE

At forty-nine, Celeste has long renounced the religion of her childhood. Yet she finds herself reluctantly accompanying her mother and sister to a pilgrimage site in Romania, where her devout mother seeks a miracle - a cure for her terminal illness. As Celeste tries to come to terms with her mother's impending decline, she realises she has to confront the unspoken conflicts embedded in the foundations of her family. Away from her husband, she must also face her fear of what the future holds for them both.

Written with heart-rending precision, warmth and grace, PILGRIMAGE is a powerful meditation on how our personal histories haunt us, and an affirmation of the hope and sustenance that may be found in our imperfect families.

Jacinta Halloran works as a GP in Melbourne. She has written on medical science for The Sunday Age, and her short stories have been published in New Australian Stories 2 and The Pen and the Stethoscope. Her first novel, Dissection, was published in 2008.