Bright and Distant Shores

Shortlisted for The Age Book of the Year and The Vance Palmer Prize. They were showing the savages on the rooftop--that was the word at the kerbstone. Set amid the skyscrapers of 1890s Chicago and the far-flung islands of the South Pacific, Bright and Distant Shoresis both a sweeping epic and a triumph of lyrical storytelling. Chicago First Equitable has won the race to construct the world's tallest building and its president, Hale Gray, hits upon a surefire way to make it an enduring landmark: to establish on the roof an exhibition of real-life 'savages'. He sponsors a South Seas voyage to collect not only weaponry and artefacts, but also 'several natives related by blood' for the company's rooftop spectacle. Caught up in this scheme are two orphans: Owen Graves, the voyage's head trader from Chicago's South Side, and Argus Niu, a mission houseboy in Melanesia--two young men haunted by their pasts. With echoes of Melville, Doctorow and Carey, Bright and Distant Shoresis at once a remarkable love story and a breathtaking adventure that chronicles the clash of the tribal and the civilised at a pivotal moment in history. An extraordinary feat of imagination and storytelling, it will wholly seduce you.