THE MAN IN THE WATER

On his first day of his final year at school, Shaun sees his first dead body.

When 16-year-old Shaun discovers a dead body in the lake of a quiet mining town in outback Queensland, he immediately reports it to the police. But when he returns to the site with the constable, the body is gone.

Since his father drowned a few years earlier, his mum and the authorities doubt that he saw a body at all, and his mum books him into a psychologist.

Shaun and his friend Will open their own investigation, believing the body must be the result of a murder or a mining mishap, determined to show the town the truth.

David Burton is a writer from Brisbane who is best known for his award-winning theatre work. He's written over two dozen professionally produced plays, including April's Fool (Playlab Press), which toured nationally in 2012, and his YA memoir, How to Be Happy, won the Text YA Prize in 2014. David works as a professional editor, teacher and dramaturge. He has a Bachelor in Theatre Arts from USQ and a Masters in Creative Industries (Creative Writing) from QUT, and he taught theatre, literature and creative writing at USQ for four years. David is currently studying his doctorate and continues to write theatre-in-education touring pieces of the Grin and Tonic Theatre Troupe.