Piper's Son

Melina Marchetta, the Australian author behind Finnikin of the Rock and Jellicoe Road, returns to the circle of friends she first wrote about in Saving Francesca. This time the focus is on Thomas Mackee, who has been changed by the sudden death of an uncle he adored, a loss that took place in a foreign city while the man was going to work.

Tom's family came apart after that. He dropped out of school, let go of the music that once mattered to him, and cut ties with the people closest to him, including a girl he still cannot stop thinking about. Drinking heavily and chasing nothing but numbness, he ends up living with his pregnant aunt, who is on her own, and taking a job at the Union pub alongside his old friends. His father is also grieving and drinks too much, and Tom must face him as well.

Tom has no strength to repair what has been broken, and the novel asks what happens when the people around him are in the same state. It is a frank exploration of family, forgiveness, and the complicated nature of love and friendship, and it follows a young man trying to find his way back to the people and places he left behind.