Ghost Bird

Teacher Resource

Publisher's synopsis

Remember daughter, the world is a lot bigger than anyone knows. There are things that science may never explain. Maybe some things that shouldn’t be explained.

Stacey and Laney are twins – mirror images of each other – and yet they’re as different as the sun and the moon. Stacey works hard at school, determined to get out of their small town. Laney skips school and sneaks out of the house to meet her boyfriend. But when Laney disappears one night, Stacey can’t believe she’s just run off without telling her.

As the days pass and Laney doesn’t return, Stacey starts dreaming of her twin. The dreams are dark and terrifying, difficult to understand and hard to shake, but at least they tell Stacey one key thing – Laney is alive. It’s hard for Stacey to know what’s real and what’s imagined and even harder to know who to trust. All she knows for sure is that Laney needs her help.

Stacey is the only one who can find her sister. Will she find her in time?

Awards

Winner, 2020 ACT Book of the Year Award
Winner, 2020 Queensland Literary Awards – Griffith University Young Adult Book Award
Winner, Readings Young Adult Book Prize 2020
Winner, 2020 Norma K Hemming Award – Long Work
Winner, 2017 Queensland Literary Awards – Unpublished Indigenous Writer: David Unaipon Award
Honour Book, 2020 CBCA Book of the Year Awards – Book of the Year: Older Readers
Shortlisted, The NSW Premier’s Literary Awards 2021 – Ethel Turner Prize for Young People’s Literature
Shortlisted, Aurealis Award – Best Young Adult Novel
Longlisted, Australian Book Design Awards 2020 (ABDAs) – Best Designed Young Adult Cover

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Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia

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Lisa Fuller

Lisa Fuller is a Wuilli Wuilli woman from Eidsvold, Queensland, and is also descended from Gooreng Gooreng and Wakka Wakka peoples. She won the 2017 David Unaipon Award for an Unpublished Indigenous Writer, the 2018 Varuna Eleanor Dark Flagship Fellowship, was a joint winner of the 2018 Copyright Agency Fellowships for First Nations Writers, and placed second in the 2018 Feminartsy Memoir Prize. Lisa’s young adult novel, Ghost Bird, won the Griffith University Young Adult Book Award in the Queensland Literary Awards, the Norma K Hemming Award, and Readings Young Adult Prize in 2020, and was shortlisted for the 2021 Ethel Turner Prize for Young People’s Literature and 2022 Indigenous Writers’ Prize at the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards.She has previously published poetry, blogs and short fiction. Lisa is an editor and publishing consultant, and is passionate about culturally appropriate writing and publishing.

Lisa is a member of Us Mob Writing, the Canberra Speculative Fiction Guild, the First Nations Australia Writers Network, and the Canberra Society of Editors.

Photo by Camille Walsh, courtesy of UQP

Ghost Bird kept me reading well into the night – with all the lights on! The novel draws you deep into the bonds between sisters, family, and community, and is a fantastic addition to the Australian speculative fiction scene, from a truly talented Murri author. This book is for everyone, and I loved it.

Amie Kaufman

Further Details

Author Lisa Fuller

Publisher UQP

Date of Publication 2019

ISBN 9780702260230

Category Young Adult

Pages

288