Better Days

(Paperback)

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Description

Twenty years ago, Grace wanted nothing more than to be with Trent - a boy with a guitar and a lot of promises. Twenty years ago, Dorothy wanted nothing more than for her daughter to fulfil her potential.

In a moment of heartbreak and fury, Grace makes a split-second decision to board a plane to London and put an ocean between them. There, Grace takes a job answering calls for a wannabe music mogul and sends her life on a dazzling trajectory, resulting in an illustrious career managing a megastar, large houses in glamorous places, two children (one who might be a sociopath but the other seems fine) and marriage to Ed. Ed who would do anything for her ... except move back in.

Now, Grace is dragging her kids and a particularly irritating dachshund to her childhood home, where Dorothy is waiting with a roast and inevitable questions about where it all went wrong. On a McDonald's pitstop, among fractious kids and a runaway dog, she bumps into a ghost from the past ... Trent.

Claire Zorn perfectly encapsulates the pitfalls of fledgling adulthood and the 'what ifs' of later life. She explores how the demands of being an adult - career, marriage, motherhood - can chip away at who we are, and she accomplishes it with writing that is compassionate, creative, funny and thought-provoking.

Author Bio

Claire Zorn is the multi-award-winning author of four books for young adults and the author/illustrator of one picture book. She lives on the south coast of New South Wales with her husband and two sons. Her first young adult novel, The Sky So Heavy, was a 2014 Children's Book Council of Australia Honour Book for Older Readers, shortlisted in the 2013 Aurealis Awards - Best Young Adult Novel and shortlisted in the 2014 Inky Awards. Her second young adult novel, The Protected, was the winner of four awards: the 2015 Prime Minister's Literary Award for Young Adult Fiction; the 2015 Victorian Premier's Literary Awards - Young Adult Fiction Prize; the 2015 Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year for Older Readers; and the 2016 Western Australian Premier's Book Awards - Young Adult. It was also shortlisted in the 2015 Inky Awards. Her third book for young adults, One Would Think the Deep was awarded the 2017 Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year for Older Readers. When We Are Invisible is her latest novel for young adults, and the sequel to The Sky So Heavy. Better Days is Claire's first novel for adults.