A Piece of Red Cloth

WINNER, 2026 PRIME MINISTER'S LITERARY AWARD FOR FICTION 

WINNER, 2026 AUSTRALIAN BOOK INDUSTRY AWARD FOR SOCIAL IMPACT BOOK OF THE YEAR 

It's early in the wet season. A flock of crested terns sweeps into the bay  dives towards Batjani. The birds are saying the foreigners are coming, as they do every year, but why are they so full of menace?

Batjani's beloved granddaughter Garritji is on the cusp of womanhood, about to go through the rituals preparing her for marriage. Batjani uses all means at her disposal to protect her granddaughter from the visiting Macassan trepang fishers, but she is betrayed. Can Garritji be saved?

This powerful and unique novel is based on oral history and told through Yolngu eyes, with ancestors as the Yolngu remember them: proud, strong, resilient people in control of their world and interacting with foreigners on their own terms.

"Told through the voices of the people who know it best, all those deeply important events from times long before Cook imagined a Southern Land." Debra Dank

Pages: 384

Published: February 2025