AustLit
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This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'A quirky, delicious novel about a 14-year-old boy and his appetites ...
'Gus's life is getting out of hand. Muscle-bound Steve has started picking on him at school, his friends desert him, no one appreciates his gourmet lunches (except Brother Nicholas), and his older brother, Luke, insists on using Gus as a go-between for his romantic liaisons.
'When Luke sets his sights on the object of Gus's affection, the elegant, bulimic Trinity, things go completely out of control.
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assertionUntapped says of Night Gate:
Night Gate is the first in a planned trilogy by bestselling and much loved fantasy author Isobelle Carmody. It was followed by Winter Door, also in the Untapped Collection, but the third title has long remained unwritten. Will the inclusion of the first two books in the Untapped Collection inspire the author to complete the trilogy?
Explore the publication history of this work in the AustLit record, linked below.
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Desperate to help her ill mother, Rage Winnoway travels through a strange gateway to Valley, a land of mythical beasts, talking dogs and streets that change shapes. But Valley is no paradise. Harsh guardians rule a sinister black city, and fugitive witch folk work forbidden magic. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
This image has been sourced from online.'At once funny and sad, quirky and moving, here is a powerful novel about change and growth, about fear, about the things in life we can control - and those we can't.' (Publisher's blurb)See full AustLit entry
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This image has been sourced from online.Josie finds that living in a small Australian country town and helping her parents run the general store is very different from living in Melbourne. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
A five-book series set in a distant time and a distant valley.
Untapped says of the first volume:
Set in a world where the climate has already changed, this is the first book in beloved author Jackie French’s Children of the Valley series.
All five books in this series are included in Untapped's digitisation project.
Explore the publication history of this work in the AustLit record, linked below.
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A series set many years in the future where, as far as the people of the Valley know, they are the only people still left in the world. No one leaves the valley except the scavenging Collectors, looking for metals and new plants—no one, except for two children, Possum and Mopoke, and their companion, the former Collector, Desert Wind. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'Mick is in year 8 at a high school on the edge of the city. When the new history teacher, Penny, casts him as the Artful Dodger in the production of Oliver, he's unsure of what everyone will think. His Nan, who he lives with, will come but what about his Dad, a long distance truck driver? Told from Mick's point of view in a straight narrative and through Penny's letters to a friend.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
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This image has been sourced from online.'Andrew's sister Anna likes fighting for causes, and she's getting Andrew involved in her latest one - the plight of East Timorese asylum-seekers in Australia. Andrew's never broken the law before. But the law and the government don't seem to care about a stranger who's had to run for her life. Escaping a hostile regime. Seeking refuge . . .'. (Source: bookseller's website.) (...more)See full AustLit entry -
This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'My name is Tessa. I am strong. I am brave. I do not cry. These are the only things I know for certain.
'I was found in the bush, ragged as a wild thing. I have no memory - not even of how I got the long, striping slashes across my back. They make me frightened of what I might remember.
'The policewoman, Connolly, found me a place in a boarding school and told me about her daughter, Cat, who went missing in the bush. I think there is a connection between Cat, me, and the strange things going on at this school.
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See full AustLit entry'Cold Iron is set in a fairytale world---a kind of parallel Elizabethan period. It is based on the English fairytale Tattercoats (which is a kind of Cinderella story) and Shakespeare's beautiful play, A Midsummer Night's Dream. It enters the fairy kingdom of Titania and Oberon, and takes the reader into the vivid world of Elizabethan England. Tattercoats is the neglected, beautiful grand-daughter of the rich Baron of Fisher Forest, who is inconsolable because of his daughter's death in bearing Tattercoats.
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This image has been sourced from online.'The Firebird is a spellbinding story set in the splendours and savageries of old Russia. Ivan, son of the powerful and greedy Tsar Demyan, and Tamara, daughter of the gentle King Djoti, have known each other since they were small, and are in love. But Tamara has been promised to Ivan's eldest half-brother, Yuri, a rough and brutal man who delights in making Ivan's life a misery. On the night of Yuri's engagement to Tamara, Ivan, griefstricken, slips out of the palace and into the gardens. Tamara joins him, and in the moonlight they are amazed to see a rare firebird come feast on a golden apple, then fly away. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
Image courtesy of publisher's website.See full AustLit entry'It's the middle of the thirteenth century in the little riverside village of Crundall. For 16-year-old orphan Jack Fisher, it's one of the best times of the year, for the Fair of St Thomas is in full swing, and this year, the most extraordinary creature ever captured is being displayed: a merman. Jack has come prepared to stare and goggle with the others, but there's something about this creature that affects Jack most strongly. Perhaps it is because he himself has been born with webbed toes on one foot, and knows full well how cruel people can be with their teasing.
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This image has been sourced from online.A teenage boy who robs houses with a group of school friends, forms a strange attachment to an old house and a dog, and unwittingly solves the mystery of a missing boy. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
133209assertionFirst published in 1988, Answers to Brut was an honour book in the 1989 Children's Book Council of Australia Awards.
Untapped says:
Bestselling and much loved author Gillian Rubinstein’s cautionary tale about just what can happen when you borrow someone else’s dog.
Explore the publication history of this work in the AustLit record, linked below.
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This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'The story of two boys' adventures while trying to find a dog called Brut. The novel raises questions about the nature of fear and intimidation and the possibility of confronting them without resorting to violence.'
Source: Publisher's blurb (Mammoth ed.).
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This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'Life is difficult enough for Brenton. He can't get on with his parents, his younger brother is overtaking him in every way and now twelve-year-old Victoria must come and live with them too.
This turbulent, powerful novel follows Brenton as he loses himself in his beloved role playing games where the fantasy dangerously shadows real life'.
Source: author's website.
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This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'Foxspell is a fable of shape-shifters and animal spirits, of teenage gangs and schoolyard friends and finding your place in the world—or worlds—all concentrated in a dense, vivid corner of the half-wild Adelaide hills. A Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year for Older Readers, Foxspell is a mysterious and unforgettable dream.
'Deserted by his father, Tod moves with his sisters and mother into his grandmother's house in the foothills of Adelaide, South Australia. He finds refuge in the hills and quarries, where he meets a fox spirit who teaches him to cross between the human and animal worlds.
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This image has been sourced from online.In the year 2026, three young Australians, a brother and two sisters, are kidnapped by space pirates and taken to another galaxy to perform for aliens in a futuristic amphitheatre (...more)See full AustLit entry -
This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'No-one has ever escaped from the Galax-Arena before. Now Project Genesis Five wants to know how Joella, Peter and Liane did it.On the run from the all-seeing, all-knowing Project, the girls find shelter at Terra-Farma, while Peter tries to survive in the outback. But Terra-Farma is not what it seems. Can Joelle escape again?'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
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A science-fiction series about four young players caught in a deadly computer game with a difference, battling against its powerful artifical intelligence. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
A boy in his early teens finds out about life, and the strength of his own feelings and emotions - as well as those of his enemies - on one very wet adventurous Anzac Day holiday. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
128193assertionCommended at the Children's Book Council of Australia Awards for 1970.
Untapped says:
A gripping story about an accident that changes everyone’s lives by beloved children’s author Ivan Southall.
Explore the publication history of this work in the AustLit record, linked below.
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This image has been sourced from onlineSee full AustLit entryAn accident on a foggy Australian country road brings together the lives of five children and five adults.
The Kirkus Review in 1969 offered the following synopsis:
Four children alone in an isolated lakeside cabin on a cold, foggy night, the oldest, Max, an edgy fifteen, the youngest, David, infantile at nine; the sound of a crash, of repeated thuds from the hairpin road on which their parents should be returning . . . the situation is so portentous, its demands so exacting and conflicting, subsequent occurrences so compelling that one wishes Mr.
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This image has been sourced from onlineWhen his precious cache of opals is stolen, fourteen-year-old Ernie, who lives with his alcoholic father in the harsh and lawless opal fields of inland Australia, sets out with a friend determined to find the thief. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
assertionUntapped says:
The first book in internationally bestselling author Sean Williams’ Broken Land trilogy.
All three volumes in this trilogy are included in Untapped's digitisation project.
Explore the publication history of these works in the AustLit record, linked below.
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Set in a world of drought, dust, and desperation, the Broken Land trilogy follows Ros on perilous journeys across strange and shifting landscapes. (...more)See full AustLit entry -
This image has been sourced from online.See full AustLit entry'Niko and his family are trapped in Sarajevo during the Bosnian War. The siege lasts for three years and Niko's family struggle to find enough food and avoid the snipers whose targets are civilians in the streets.
'Niko and his friend Nadim take refuge from the bombing in the stairwell of their apartment building and together they find hope in the midst of a war they did not start but must try to survive.' (Publication summary)
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