Oceania

Materials from Oceania

The Legend Of The Golden Snail

A young boy’s favorite storybook tells of a Golden Snail that lived long ago in the mythical Spiral Isles. When it journeyed through its magical realm, it took on the shape of a fantastical golden sailing ship. One day the ship was captured by a Great Enchanter and put under his spell. After he became bored with the Snail, the Enchanter banished it to the Ends of the Earth so no one else could ever sail in it. There it remains until a new master comes to claim it. Could a young boy named Wilbur be the next master? Featuring Graeme Base’s visually stunning signature art (packed with details, including a hidden “snail and crossbones” to search for in each picture) and a bonus mini book (bound in, nonremovable), “The Legend of the Golden Snail” is an adventure unlike any other.

Stolen

Gemma, 16, is on layover at Bangkok Airport, en route with her parents to a vacation in Vietnam. She steps away for just a second, to get a cup of coffee. Ty–rugged, tan, too old, oddly familiar–pays for Gemma’s drink. And drugs it. They talk. Their hands touch. And before Gemma knows what’s happening, Ty takes her. Steals her away. The unknowing object of a long obsession, Gemma has been kidnapped by her stalker and brought to the desolate Australian Outback. STOLEN is her gripping story of survival, of how she has to come to terms with her living nightmare–or die trying to fight it.

See the review at WOW Review, Volume 4, Issue 1

Factotum

Rossamund Bookchild stands accused of not truly being a human at all, but of being a monster. Even the protection of Europe, the Branden Rose the most feared and renowned monster-hunter in all the Half-Continent might not be enough to save him. Powerful forces move against them both, intent on capturing Rossamund whose existence some believe may hold the secret to perpetual youth.

Foundling (Monster Blood Tattoo, Book 1)

Meet Rossamünda foundling, a boy with a girls name who is about to begin a dangerous life in the service of the Emperor of the Half-Continent. What starts as a simple journey becomes a dangerous and complicated set of battles and decisions. Humans, monsters, unearthly creatures . . . who among these can Rossamünd trust? D. M. Cornish has created an entirely original world, grounded in his own deft, classically influenced illustrations. Foundling is a magic-laced, Dickensian adventure that will transport the reader.

Everlasting

Sailing aboard her father’s ship is all seventeen-year-old Camille Rowen has ever wanted. But as a lady in 1855 San Francisco, her future is set to marry a man she doesn’t love to preseve her social standing. On her last voyage before the wedding, Camille learns the mother she has always believed dead is alive and in Australia. When their Sydney-bound ship goes down in a gale, and her father dies, Camille sets out to find her mother with a map believed to lead to a stone that once belonged to the legendary civilization of immortals. The stone can bring someone back from the dead. Unfortunately, her father’s adversary is also on the hunt for the stone, and she must race him to it. The only person Camille can depend on is Oscar, a handsome young sailor and her father’s first mate, who is in love with Camille and whom she is drawn to despite his low social standing and her pending wedding vows. With an Australian card shark acting as their guide, Camille eludes murderous bushrangers, traverses dangerous highlands, evades a curse placed on the stone, and unravels the mystery behind her mother’s disappearance sixteen years earlier. But when another death shakes her conviction to resurrect her father, Camille must choose what and who matters most.

The Snow Bear

“The bear came into town in the Autumn to feed at the dump. Her cubs had been killed by hunters and she was weary. Only Bruun saw her plight…” So begins a friendship between two unlikely companions ­ Bruun, an Inuit Eskimo boy, and a snow bear from the wild. As they spend the winter out on the sea-ice together, Bruun learns the ways of the polar bear. But when spring comes, he must return home to the ways of his own people. What will happen, years later, when the two meet again and Bruun has become a hunter?

Dreamtime: Aboriginal Stories

An Australian Aboriginal writer reminisces about her childhood on Stradbrooke Island off the Queensland coast, communicates her pride in her heritage, and presents a collection of traditional Aboriginal folklore.