Coal Creek

WINNER OF THE 2014 VICTORIAN PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARD FOR FICTION LONGLISTED FOR THE 2014 IMPAC DUBLIN LITERARY AWARDS SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2014 PRIME MINISTER'S LITERARY AWARDS AND THE SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2014 ALS GOLD MEDAL SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2014QUEENSLAND LITERARY AWARDS SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2014WESTERN AUSTRALIAN PREMIER'S BOOK AWARDS When his father dies, Bobby Blue decides to leave the Mount Hay cattle station where they worked side by side and take a job in town as the new constable's offsider. Daniel, the constable, his wife Esme and their two girls, Irie and Miriam, are new to the western country and, struggling to understand its inhabitants, invite Bobby to stay in a hut on their property where he is educated alongside their daughters. But there's a simmering tension, building quietly and strongly, beneath the overt goodwill. And when first Irie then Miriam become involved in a dispute that threatens violence, there's an abrupt and ruthless change in attitude from Daniel and Esme towards Bobby. When tragedy strikes at Coal Creek the true nature of the perceived friendship is laid bare with consequences that will haunt Bobby for decades.

Alex Miller has twice won the prestigious Miles Franklin Literary Award, Australia's premier literary prize; the first occasion in 1993 for The Ancestor Game, and again in 2003 for Journey to the Stone Country. He is also an overall winner of the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, for The Ancestor Game, in 1993. British by birth, he now lives in Victoria.