Musk & Byrne

A tumultuous and enthralling novel set in the 19th century Victorian goldfields, featuring passions, obsession and a headstrong heroine determined on a creative life. From the acclaimed author of Night Surfing, Last of the Sane Days, and That Oceanic Feeling.

Australian society in th e1800s is no place for a sel-aware and headstrong woman seeking independence from the strictures placed on her by a conservative society, but this is exacly what Jemma Musk is.Jemma Musk is settling into her new home in the bustling goldfields town of Wombat Hill, wanting to establish herself as a painter and an independent woman. But word has gone out that she saw a young girl brush with death. Instead of saving her, she sketched her. What kind of woman does that?

This is not the last time that Jemma Musk will find herself hounded by gossip and scandal. Even after she has married Gotardo, an Italian-Swiss dairy farmer, and given birth to their daughter Lucy, happiness is denied her. A tragedy sets Jemma on the run from the law, and a legend - that of the beautiful outlaw Musk and her accomplice Byrne - is born.

The passionate and headstrong Jemma, determined to live the creative life, is a heroine in the mould of Sybylla from My Brilliant Career. She will win your heart in this tumultuous and enthralling novel by the author of Night Surfing, Last of the Sane Days, and the award-winning That Oceanic Feeling.

About Fiona Capp
Fiona Capp was born in Melbourne in 1963. She trained as a journalist, has a PhD in English and has worked as a freelance writer and university tutor in English, journalism and novel writing at the University of Melbourne, La Trobe University and RMIT. Her first book, Writers Defiled was shortlisted for the FAW Australian Unity Literature Award in 1993. Night Surfing, her first novel, was shortlisted for the 1997 Nita B. Kibble Awards and the Toulon Bookfair Awards. Her second novel, Last of the Sane Days, was shortlisted for the Age Fiction Book of the Year and was nominated in Australia for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Both novels have been published in France. Her memoir of her love for the sea and surfing, That Oceanic Feeling won the Australians Studying Abroad Travel Writing Prize and the Nita B. Kibble Literary Award for women writers in 2004. Capp lives in Brunswick, Melbourne, with her partner and son.

Musk & Byrne
Allen & Unwin
Author: Fiona Capp
ISBN: 9781741753936
RRP: $24.95