Some of the towns and geographical locations in this novel are real enough, but the imagined stations and communities and characters that lie at the heart of the story are entirely my creation, and bear no relationship to the real world.
Similarly, I do reference actual language groups of the Kimberley, in particular the Bunuba. I have worked for many decades with the Bunuba community. But that work has been a jumping-off point. In this novel I am not describing actual Bunuba country, or real Bunuba people. And nor should it be thought that this work is endorsed in any way by the community; it is my imagining, and my responsibility.
Three of the characters have appeared in my other work. Dancer and Andy first came to life in my children’s novel Barefoot Kids, and Marralam is a fictional warrior in my stage play Jandamarra. It took the idiosyncrasies of my wandering mind to bring them together here.