Daughter of the Plateau by Karen Harrland

What does it mean to have no place to call home, and no family to turn to?

Manna, named for the regal white gums and yellow-tailed black cockatoos of the Central Highlands of Tasmania, was a wild, strong, fiercely independent child. But Manna’s life was torn apart, first by her mother’s abandonment, then by her father’s coldness. Craving connection, yet wounded by her past, Manna pushes away the last of the people she cares about.

Wild places can heal but are they enough? A whale stranding and an encounter with a silver-haired woman force Manna to reckon with the elemental forces within and around her. Grieving and alone, she must tear open old wounds and confront the people she once loved the most, if she is to reclaim her identity as a daughter of the Plateau.

From the author of Spinifex Baby, winner of the National 2014 Finch Memoir Prize.

Karen now lives on the side of kunanyi (Mt Wellington) in Tasmania, not too far from the Central Plateau where this story begins. The North-West Bay River runs past her property and where the river meets the sea she works as a storytelling teacher at the local Primary School.

Whenever possible, Karen will be found writing, bushwalking or swimming in the beautiful Tasmanian wilderness.