Home Fires

Description

'Fiona Lowe's ability to create atmosphere and tension and real relationship dynamics is a gift.' - Sally Hepworth, bestselling author of The Mother In Law When a lethal bushfire tore through Myrtle, nestled in Victoria's breathtaking Otway Ranges, the town's buildings - and the lives of its residents - were left as smouldering ash. For three women in particular, the fire fractured their lives and their relationships. Eighteen months later, with the flurry of national attention long past, Myrtle stands restored, shiny and new. But is the outside polish just a veneer? Community stalwart Julie thinks tourism could bring back some financial stability to their little corner of the world and soon prods Claire, Bec and Sophie into joining her group. But the scar tissue of trauma runs deep, and as each woman exposes her secrets and faces the damage that day wrought, a shocking truth will emerge that will shake the town to its newly rebuilt foundations... With her sharp eye for human foibles, bestselling author Fiona Lowe writes an evocative tale of everyday people fighting for themselves, their families and their town - as only this distinctively Australian storyteller can. Praise for Fiona Lowe: 'A book that delivers numerous shocks and is one that cannot be put down.' GLAM Adelaide 'Fiona Lowe is the queen of Australian country town fiction' Canberra Weekly 'A great grassroots yarn.' Woman's Day 'Lowe is a master at painting believable characters ... an addictive read.' The Weekly Times on Birthright 'Distinctly Australian with its power to evoke grit and tenderness, joy and bleakness, tragedy and comedy, all at once.' Better Reading on Birthright 'A sweeping Australian novel of lost love and tangled family secrets.' Australian Country on Daughter of Mine

FIONA LOWE has been a midwife, a sexual health counsellor and a family support worker; an ideal career for an author who writes novels about family and relationships. She spent her early years in Papua New Guinea where, without television, reading was the entertainment and it set up a lifelong love of books. Although she often re-wrote the endings of books in her head, it was the birth of her first child that prompted her to write her first novel. A recipient of the prestigious USA RITA (R) award and two Australian RuBY awards, Fiona writes books that are set in small country towns. They feature real people facing difficult choices and explore how family ties and relationships impact on their decisions. When she's not writing stories, she's a distracted wife, mother of two 'ginger' sons, a volunteer in her community, guardian of eighty rose bushes, a slave to a cat, and is often found collapsed on the couch with wine. You can find her at her website, fionalowe.com, and on Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads.