Acknowledgements

This story takes place on the traditional lands of the Barkandji people, and I pay my respects to Elders past and present.

This is a work of fiction. However, the location is not, and it was the site of some of the harshest wool-growing practices in Australia during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I have changed the names of the two main towns in the story, but – for now – the Darling River still flows. Augustus Hawkins is a fictional character, as is his war record. He is no Flashman. Rather, his experiences in the Boer War are an amalgamation of the many battles and skirmishes Australian soldiers were involved in.

Some Australians did sign on again and again, some fought under direct British command and some even fought on the side of the Boer. Many of these men were traumatised by their experiences and returned to a world that saw manifestations of trauma as moral weakness and failure of will. They suffered terribly, and I pay my respects to those men, and the women who cared for them.

Writing is mostly a solitary pursuit, but publishing a book is a collaborative venture, and so I’d like to thank Ruby Ashby-Orr, Elizabeth Robinson-Griffith and the team at Affirm Press. Also thank you to Julian Welch for his thoughtful editing and to Bill Bennell Kooyar Wongi for his reading.

Thanks to Penelope Edwell, curator at the Justice and Police Museum, Museums of History NSW, for her generous help. Also, a huge thank you to the indefatigable librarians at the Northern Beaches Council Library for their patience, professionalism and courtesy when dealing with my endless requests for obscure material through the Interlibrary Loans Service. Thank you, also, to the librarians at the State Library of NSW and the archivists at the NSW State Archives.

Thanks to the Sydney Faber Academy, Margo Lanagan and Gretchen Shirm and to my fellow participants in WAN 22 who have been so generous with their support.

Thanks also to my family and dear friends, both in Adelaide and Sydney, without whom I would not have lasted the distance.