ABBEY'S BOOKSELLER PICK ----- This richly rewarding novel is set in Hobart in the 1950s and the 1850s. Hugh Dixon has approached an estranged uncle, Walter, to avert his father’s disgrace. Impressed by Hugh, Walter encourages him in his desire to be an artist, and instructs him in the family history. Walter's father Martin participated in a notorious bushranger's Utopian settlement. Parallels exist: history repeats. This is a multi-layered book with a slowly unfolding, beautifully textured, style. It will be on all the literary award lists – read it before it wins! Lindy
-----
Twice winner of the Miles Franklin Award, Christopher Koch returns with a remarkable novel of gripping narrative power. Young Hugh Dixon believes he can save his father from ruin if he asks his estranged great-uncle Walter - a wealthy lawyer who lives alone in a Tasmanian farmhouse passed down through the family - for help. As he is drawn into Walter's rarefied world, Hugh discovers that both his uncle and the farmhouse are linked to a notorious episode in the mid-19th century. Walter's father, Martin, was living in the house when it was raided by members of an outlaw community run by Lucas Wilson, a charismatic ex-soldier attempting to build a utopia. But like later societies with communitarian ideals, Nowhere Valley was controlled by the gun, with Wilson as benevolent dictator. 20-year-old Martin's sojourn in the Valley as Wilson's disciple has become an obsession with Walter Dixon: one which haunts his present and keeps the past tantalisingly close. As Walter encourages Hugh's ambition to become an artist, and again comes to his aid when one of Hugh's friends is charged with murder, the way life's patterns repeat themselves from one generation to another becomes eerily apparent. Dramatic, insightful and evocative, this is an intriguing double narrative that confirms Koch as one of our most significant and compelling novelists.
By:
Christopher Koch Imprint: Harper Collins Country of Publication: Australia Dimensions:
Height: 235mm,
Width: 157mm,
Spine: 25mm
Weight: 741g ISBN:9780732294632 ISBN 10: 0732294630 Pages: 464 Publication Date:01 October 2012 Audience:
General/trade
,
ELT Advanced
Format:Paperback Publisher's Status: Active
