This enchanting fable of a young woman and a wild boy is a haunting

meditation on the nature of love and loss.

Maddy, an old lady now, arrives home one day to find a peculiar boy waiting for her. Over tea, she tells him the story of her life long ago, when she wished for her days to be as romantic and mysterious as a fairy tale. It was then that she fell painfully in love with a free spirit named Feather, who put aside his wild ways to live with her in a little cottage, conceived with her a child never to be born, and disappeared — leaving an inconsolable Maddy to follow after him on a fantastical journey across the sea. In a beautifully crafted tale, currently shortlisted for a 2008 Commonwealth Writers Prize, Sonya Hartnett masterfully explores the mysteries of the heart, the sustaining power of memory, and the ultimate consolation that comes to souls who live fully and fearlessly.

"Hartnett (Surrender) introduces an unlikely protagonist for a one-of-a-kind love story. When 75-year-old Matilda Victoria Adelaide, or Maddy, comes home to find a mysterious boy awaiting her, she thinks it 'odd, but also somehow flattering, as when a stray cat chooses your house to call home.' She tells him about her youth and about falling in love. Thus begins a tale that revels in profound questions ('How... does one craft sturdy happiness out of something as important, as complicated, as unrepeatable and as easily damaged as a life?'; 'What is the world's most beautiful thing?'; is life 'settling for what you can get, if you can't have what you really want?') and Maddy's tireless pursuit of their answers as they unfold through her relationship with Feather, a youth who captures her heart so totally that she is forever changed. Those who enjoy fables or magical realism will be spellbound by this redemptive story of a search for love, love lost and love (of a sort) found again. If the emotional distance created by the narrative frame proves a barrier for other readers, the exquisite prose may yet hold them. Ages 14 — up." Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

In a beautifully crafted tale of a young woman and a wild boy, Hartnett masterfully explores the mysteries of the heart, the sustaining power of memory, and the ultimate consolation that comes to souls who live fully and fearlessly.