The Secret River

'Grenville's powerful telling of this story is so moving, so exciting, that you're barely aware of how heavy and profound its meaning is until you reach the end in a moment of stunned sadness.' * Washington Post * 'The Secret River is a masterwork, a book that transcends historical fiction and becomes something deeply contemporary and pressing.' * Chicago Tribune * '...Grenville's magnificent novel [is] an unflinching exploration of modern Australia's origins.' * New Yorker * 'A vivid and moving protrayal of poverty, struggle and the search for peace.' * Independent * 'An outstanding study of cultures in collision...chilling, meticulous account of the sorrows and evils of colonialism.' * Saturday Guardian * 'Splendidly paced, passionate and disturbing.' -- Salley Vickers * The Times * 'Kate Grenville's The Secret River stands out as a work of sustained power and imagination, of poetry and insight. No truer piece of fiction has been written about the Australian past.' -- Peter Temple * Weekend Australian * '...a powerful, highly credible account of how a limited man of good instincts becomes involved in enormity and atrocity.' -- Peter Craven * Age * 'The Secret River is a wonderful novel that will change the way we think about our past...I couldn't put it down.' -- Diana Gribble * Reader * 'There is no doubt Grenville is one of our greatest writers... A book everyone should read. It is evocative, gracefully written, terrible and confronting. And it has resonance for every Australian.' * Sunday Mail * 'One of the most entertaining, accomplished, engaging novels written in this country...We always knew Kate Grenville was good but this one is brilliant.' * Courier Mail * 'A few sentences of Grenville's makes one realize that much of the writing one encounters in a novel these days is thin and perfunctory. Reading The Secret River may put you off anything less accomplished for a while.' * Daily Express * 'Fabulous historical fiction.' * Australian * 'When William Thornhill steps ashore in 1806, it's as if no one has described the scene before him. Such is the power of Grenville's imagination that everything seems newly minted.' * Bulletin *