SONG FOR A SCARLET RUNNER

The gripping story of a girl caught up in a life-and-death bargain, this is fantasy-adventure by an author with a fabulous and original storytelling voice.

Once, long ago and far from here, there were endless marshes, and in the marshes lived a marsh auntie, and that marsh auntie wore a coat with a thousand pockets, and in a pocket of that coat was a pouch, and inside the pouch was a nail, and that nail had the power to open a treacherous story... Peat is on the run – forced to flee for her life when she’s blamed for bringing bad luck to her village. She heads for the endless marshes, where she’s caught by an old healer woman who makes Peat her apprentice and teaches her the skill of storytelling. But a story can be a dangerous thing. It can take you out of one world and leave you stranded in another – and Peat finds herself trapped in an eerie place beyond the Silver River where time stands still. Her only friends are a 900-year-old boy and the sleek, a small fox-like creature who might sink his teeth into your leg one minute, and save your life the next. Julie Hunt lives on a farm in southern Tasmania and is fascinated by landscapes and the stories they inspire. This interest has taken her from the rugged west coast of Ireland to the ice caves of Romania. She loves poetry, storytelling and traditional folktales, and her own stories combine other- worldly elements with down-to-earth humour. In Song for a Scarlet Runner, Julie explores an idea that occurs in many traditional stories ? the ‘external soul’. A person’s spirit is taken from their body and hidden away so they can never be killed, but eventually time and the laws of nature catch up with them.