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9781484781517

9781484781517 Open the full-size image

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By Zana Fraillon

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$16.99

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Format:

  1. Hardcover $16.99
  2. ebook $7.99

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“Indispensable.” — Booklist (starred review)

Subhi is a refugee. He was born in an Australian permanent detention center after his mother and sister fled the violence of a distant homeland, and the center is the only world he knows. But every night, the faraway whales sing to him, the birds tell him their stories, and the magical Night Sea from his mother’s stories brings him gifts. As Subhi grows, his imagination threatens to burst beyond the limits of the fences that contain him. Until one night, it seems to do just that.

Subhi sees a scruffy girl on the other side of the wire mesh, a girl named Jimmie, who appears with a notebook written by the mother she lost. Unable to read it herself, Jimmie asks Subhi to unravel her family’s love songs and tragedies that are penned there.

Subhi and Jimmie might both find comfort — and maybe even freedom — as their tales unfold. But not until each has been braver than ever before and made choices that could change everything.

Genre:

  • Winner of the Amnesty CILIP Honour Award
    Winner of the ABIA Book of the year for Older Readers
    Winner of the Readings YA Book Prize
    IBBY Australian Honour Book
    CBCA Honour Book 2017 - Older Readers

    Shortlisted for the Carnegie Award
    Shortlisted for the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize
    Shortlisted for the 2017 Prime Minister's Literary Award
    Shortlisted for the INKY awards
    Shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award
    Shortlisted for the Queensland Literary Award
  • "Thought-provoking and affecting."
    School Library Journal
  • "Outstanding… This is an important, heartbreaking book with frequent, unexpected humour, that everyone, whether teenager or adult, should read."
    The Guardian

On Sale
Nov 1, 2016
Page Count
240 pages
Publisher
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
ISBN-13
9781484781517

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Zana Fraillon

About the Author

Zana Fraillon was born in Melbourne Australia, but spent her early childhood in San Francisco. Zana has written two picture books for young children, a series for middle readers, and a fictitious book for older readers based on research and recounts of survivors of the Forgotten Generation. She now lives in Melbourne, with her three sons, husband and two dogs. When Zana isn’t reading or writing, she likes to explore the museums and hidden passageways scattered across Melbourne. They provide the same excitement as that moment before opening a new book: preparing to step into the unknown where a whole world of possibilities awaits.

Learn more about this author