AustLit

'One girl. One dream. A few hurdles.

'Ten-year-old Vivian is determined to win a medal at the Olympic Games one day. Problem is, she hasn't found a sport she's any good at yet. But everyone says if you work hard enough you can achieve anything, right? So when Vivian discovers she has a talent for cross country running, finally, her Olympic dream might actually come true.

'But then a family illness is uncovered and all of Vivian's plans begin to unravel. Can she keep her dream alive? Or will she be stopped in her tracks?

'A funny, heartfelt novel about resilience, acceptance and dreaming big.' 

(Publication summary)

'From CBCA shortlisted author, Penny Tangey, comes a moving, funny and heartfelt coming-of-age story.

'Stevie wants a pony or a horse more than anything. She dreams horses, draws horses and follows the girls at school who have horses hoping that one day she will have her own horse too.

'But money doesn’t grow on trees and Stevie’s mother is a single mum looking after two kids and holding down a job. Some dreams seem far away when you are vacuuming, hanging out washing and going to school. Stevie has to learn to straighten out the hard things herself. Her mother is worried about her sick brother and her Dad Ben is working up north leaving Stevie rudderless in this family going round in circles. Reading between the lines, Stevie suddenly has to learn a lot about growing up.

'A beautiful novel about the fine line between life and death.' (Publisher's blurb)

'Richard Feynman was a Nobel prize-winning physicist. Catherine is a science-loving 15-year-old. Richard helped build the atom bomb. Catherine's just trying to survive school.

When your life is falling apart around you, is talking to a dead physicist normal?

Catherine thinks so, but it isn't until her life begins unravelling that she learns who she can really trust.' (From the publisher's website.)