The Piper's Son

Longlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award 2011 and shortlisted for the 2011 Prime Minister's Literary Award for Young Adult Fiction and NSW Premier's Literary Award Ethel Turner Prize for Young People's Literature Melina Marchetta's brilliant, heart-wrenching new novel takes up the story of the group of friends from her best-selling, much-loved book Saving Francesca - only this time it's five years later and Thomas Mackee is the one who needs saving. Thomas Mackee wants oblivion. Wants to forget parents who leave and friends he used to care about and a string of one-night stands, and favourite uncles being blown to smithereens on their way to work on the other side of the world. But when his flatmates turn him out of the house, Tom moves in with his single, pregnant aunt, Georgie. And starts working at the Union pub with his former friends. And winds up living with his grieving father again. And remembers how he abandoned Tara Finke two years ago, after his uncle's death. And in a year when everything's broken, Tom realises that his family and friends need him to help put the pieces back together as much as he needs them. 'Melina Marchetta is a god of the written word.' sassisamblog.com 'Elegantly crafted with a distinctly Australian voice.' Madison 'The characters are alive and vibrant on every page of this perfectly crafted story about families, relationships, love and forgiveness.' Good Reading 'For Marchetta fans, this follow-up book is like catching up with old friends down at the local; we know and love them, we've missed them and now they've returned, just like we've always known they would.' Alpha Reader Blogspot 'By no means a sequel, The Piper's Son is a stunning stand alone novel. But when you already know the characters, it adds a certain something to the experience. Having grown up with Melina Marchetta, it seems her characters have grown up with me too.' Fairfield Books on Station 'When you open the cover of a Melina Marchetta novel you have certain expectations. If you're a newbie, you expect to be blown away. If you've read her work before, you expect character depth, memorable dialogue and an intriguing family full of skeletons, battened down resentments and fierce love. The Piper's Son will meet both criteria with aplomb. pernicketysnark.com 'With all the emotion and family dramas we've come to expect from Ms Marchetta, The Piper's Son is another one of her sure-to-be-cult novels.' Dolly 'Outstanding fiction . . . ' The Sunday Age 'Marchetta is an outstanding writer.' Herald Sun 'The Piper's Son provides an interesting insight into contemporary urban life and its issues, with focus on the music scene.' The Courier Mail 'it's the type of book where the words morph, bottom out, and all of a sudden everyone and everything is three-dimensional. they hold substance. they hold the characters. and they're full. and they spiral out beautifully. heartbreakingly… so true. and so australian. and so real. and so family. beautiful to it's core. painfully so.' theuncommonnonsense/blogspot.com 'I cannot wait until our Year 8s are Year 12s so that I might share this novel with them. Rich with topics for discussion, it is worthy of becoming a class text, studied, debated, argued and appreciated. The Piper's Son has some of the loveliest, endearing and most authentic characters I have read in a long while. I love the Finch Mackees and their 'people'. I love them all. And more than anything, I want to BE one of them.' bookgryffin.globalteacher.org.au