Dancing Home

(Paperback, None ed.)

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Description

'When he was in jail, he'd begun to prepare himself for the fight of his life, a showdown with the policeman, McWilliamsa In Dubbo, he reckoned, he'd face life with death, and see who blinked first.' Blackie and Rips are fresh out of prison when they set off on a road trip back to Wiradjuri country with their mate Carlos. Blackie is out for revenge against the cop who put him in prison on false grounds. He is also craving to reconnect with his grandmother's country. Driven by his hunger for drugs and revenge, Blackie reaches dark places of both mystery and beauty as he searches for peace. He is willing to pay for that peace with his own life. Part road-movie, part 'Koori-noir', Dancing Home announces an original and darkly funny new voice in Indigenous Australian writing.

Reviews

'Dancing Home is at times heartbreaking, sometimes mystical, often laugh-out-loud funny, and reads like a road movie cranked up to 11. Paul Collis is a welcome and essential new voice in Australian writing.' Readings Monthly

Author Bio

Paul Collis is a Barkindji man, born in Bourke in far western NSW on the Darling River. Paul worked in Newcastle for much of his young adult life in the areas of teaching and in Aboriginal community development positions. He has taught Aboriginal Studies to Indigenous inmates at the Woromi and Mount Penang Juvenile Detention Centres and in Cessnock and Maitland prisons. Paul has a Bachelor of Arts degree and a doctorate in Creative Writing. He lives in Canberra and works as a Creative Writing academic at the University of Canberra. Dancing Home is his first novel and won the national 2016 David Unaipon Award for a previously unpublished Indigenous writer.