This beautifully written and gripping debut is as moving as it is frightening, and as heartbreaking as it is tender. Tom and Jordy have been living with their gran since the day their mother, Loretta, left them on her doorstep and disappeared. Now Loretta's returned, and she wants her boys back. Tom and Jordy hit the road with Loretta in her beat-up car. The family of three journeys across the country, squabbling, bonding, searching and reconnecting.
But Loretta isn't mother material. She's broke, unreliable, lost. And there's something else that's not quite right with this reunion. They reach the west coast and take refuge in a beachside caravan park. Their neighbour, a surly old man, warns the kids to stay away. But when Loretta disappears again the boys have no choice but to ask the old man for help, and now they face new threats and new fears.
SHORTLISTED FOR THE MILES FRANKLIN AWARD 2013 - JUDGES' NOTES
This increasingly sinister road-trip of a novel is narrated by eleven-year-old Tom. Along with fractious brother Jordy, Tom is repossessed without warning by their wayward mother and driven away from their settled life in the care of grandparents. Their helter-skelter flight takes the trio as far west as they can travel, to an isolated beachside caravan park and a Christmas that is memorable for all the wrong reasons.
Neglected and abandoned, the brothers must fight against an adult tide dragging them further and further out of their depth.
A debut novel of extraordinary power, Floundering grabs the reader and doesn’t let go for a second. The pitch-perfect narrative spins a spare, even mundane tale of childhood dread punctuated by weirdness, evil and exquisite humour.
