Jon Doust was born in Bridgetown, Western Australia, and spent his high school years at a private boys school in Perth. He failed his final year due to rebelliousness, drinking and surfing. After school his father insisted he take a job in a bank. The bank in its wisdom chose him for higher office on a South Pacific island. Out of that disaster came much good and Jon recovered well enough to attend a university and get a degree. He went on to write two children’s books and a novel, Boy on a Wire, which was longlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award in 2010. To the Highlands is the second work of this trilogy, which is called One Boy’s Journey to Man. Jon lives with his wife in Albany, Western Australia, where he writes in a smart house, runs, surfs, grows vegetables and agonises over the future of everything.
To the Highlands is a work of fiction. Any similarities between the characters in this book and real people, living or dead, are coincidental.