AustLit

'Author Robert Drewe’s award-winning novels are much loved for their sharply drawn portraits of Australian life. For his latest, Whipbird, he has turned his satirical eye to the type of monied professional chasing the settler tradition by owning a modest vineyard.' 

'It’s 1994 and Nate Byrne is a business student in the small university town of Gatton, Queensland. He sells weed on the side, but his friend/dealer Jesse has disappeared, precipitating a drug-drought. When a couple of violent bikies turn up looking for Jesse and a considerable sum of money, Nate’s tasked to find him, and fast. He stumbles upon a homemade porn ring, a missing fortune in pills and cash, the seedy underbelly of a rural community. A girl from the neighbourhood turns up dead. Nate’s too high to handle any of it. Traumas from his past are catching up to him. The plot comes heavy and fast. The sentences are short and sharp. Gritty. Noir. Laconic.' (Introduction)

'The Java Ridge is a boat ferrying Australian surf tourists from Bali to the killer breaks found off remote Indonesian islands to the south. Stand-in captain Isi Natoli is at the helm, while her partner, Joel, is in Perth, trying to save the business. As they head for the tiny island of Dana, another boat is en route from Sulawesi. It is the Takalar, and contains dozens of refugees seeking asylum in Australia. They have paid people smugglers, who have taken their coin even though they know the Australian government has just announced a new policy in which all responsibility for assisting boats in distress has been disavowed.' (Introduction)