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Page 23

by Kirsty Eagar


  I cut the line and dial his number. There is silence, then a clicking noise, and finally the line connects. As his mobile starts to ring and I wait for him to answer, I lean back against the wall, looking up at the black night sky.

  It’d be a perfect night for smoking. The air is cold and still and the smoke clouds from a cigarette would hang around for a while like ghosts, before going straight up.

  But just breathing is enough.

  acknowledgements

  Thank you, Jason, for everything the whole way. I am hugely grateful to my agent Selwa Anthony (and Brian, Linda and Selena), my publisher Laura Harris and my editor Amy Thomas, and my wholehearted thanks go to Tony Palmer and the team at Penguin. Advice and encouragement from Kennedy Estephan and Peter Lancett helped me immensely while writing this book. I would also like to thank the Children’s Book Council of Australia (New South Wales) for their generous support. Rohan Nott filled me in on the details of mining life, and Dr Anina Rich of the Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science, Macquarie University, generously provided me with background information on synaesthesia – any errors, in interpretation or otherwise, are mine alone. For years of listening, thank you Dixie Creaghe and Jeanette Eagar. And for seeing the wave, thanks to Geoff and Pam Nott. My thanks also go to Sue Booker, Julie Chevalier, Heather Christie, Derek Smith and George Mallory, who were there at the beginning.

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  About the Author

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Contents

  RAW BLUE

  1: him

  2: 88888888

  3: Outside

  4: honey-warm light

  5: sugar

  6: Six purple fish

  7: a Wafer moon.

  8: Saturday night

  9: Surf porn

  10: bitter stings

  11: Collision

  12: Closer

  13: die and lay down

  14: not yet

  15: Salsa

  16: it’s not easy sometimes

  17: blue people

  18: the brazilians

  19: friday’s bubble

  20: Sex

  21: the tasman sea swell

  22: turtlebacks at dee why

  23: toxic shock

  24: the lagoon

  25: going for an early

  26: deeper

  27: her

  28: trust

  29: Shadows

  30: after

  31: the trouble with you

  32: laying down

  33: flammable

  34: easter

  35: every right

  36: the glitter skin,

  acknowledgements

 

 

 


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