In a Fishbone Church

Paperback / softback

Main Details

Title In a Fishbone Church
Authors and Contributors      By (author) Catherine Chidgey
Physical Properties
Format:Paperback / softback
Dimensions(mm): Height 203,Width 133
Category/GenreModern and contemporary fiction (post c 1945)
ISBN/Barcode 9780864733351
ClassificationsDewey:FIC
Audience
General

Publishing Details

Publisher Te Herenga Waka University Press
Imprint Victoria University Press
Publication Date 4 January 2011
Publication Country New Zealand

Description

When Clifford Stilton dies, his son Gene crams his carefully kept diaries into a hall cupboard but Clifford's words have too much life in them to be ignored, and start to permeate his family's world. Clifford taught Gene about how to find rocks and fossils, and about how to kill birds and fish. Gene passes on a similar inheritance to his daughters, Bridget and Christina they have their own ways of digging and discovering the past, keeping an account of life, watching out for the varieties of death that lie hidden. Etta their mother tells a very different story of her 1940s childhood. In a fishbone church spans continents and decades. From the Berlin rave scene to the Canterbury duck season, from the rural 1950s to the cosmopolitan present, these five vivid lives cohere in a deeply affecting and exhilarating novel. In a fishbone church, Catherine Chidgey's acclaimed debut, won the Hubert Church Award for Best First Book in the Montana New Zealand Book Awards, the Adam Award, the regional Commonwealth Prize for Best First Novel, and a Betty Trask Award in the UK, where it was also longlisted for the Orange Prize. First published in 1998, it has been a bestseller in New Zealand and has been published around the world.