THE BOY AND THE DOG TREE

A magical, whimsical, wild middle grade novel about the special bond between a boy and his dog.

Mitch's life has been uprooted. Instead of the whole family moving to a new city, Mitch and his sister are staying with their gran, while their parents have been delayed working on other side of the world. He's struggling to fit in at school, with the resident Grade Five bully picking on him. The one thing that would make his life better is a dog, if only he could persuade his parents.

Then Mitch discovers an old oak tree that seems to . growl. And one night, a huge, strange dog-like creature emerges from the trunk. His name is Argos. He has been bound in the tree by 'history, mystery, magic and chance', and he is here, for a time, to help Mitch find his way.

But being different can be dangerous, especially for a wild and willful beast like Argos .

While at first Mitch looks to Argos for friendship and protection, there comes a time he must stand up for this magical creature who has changed him forever.

Fiona Wood is the award-winning author of four novels of young adult fiction, including Six Impossible Things, Wildlife, Cloudwish, and Take Three Girls, co-written with Simmone Howell and Cath Crowley. Her debut middle grade novel, How to Spell Catastrophe, was published by Pan Macmillan in 2022. Her next middle grade novel The Boy and the Dog Tree, will be published by University of Queensland Press in 2026, with a second untitled novel to follow. She has received three Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Awards and has been published internationally. Before becoming an author, she was a television scriptwriter, worked in marketing and arts management, and was a freelance journalist.