ABOUT THE BOOK

In a dying country town lives a young man fighting the future, a young woman fighting the past, and a long-lost animal that can teach them both the art of survival. 'Stripes of the Sidestep Wolf' is a shimmering, ultimately joyful novel, a story of journeying towards courage and freedom, of finding the will to live a life beyond expectation.

Sonya Hartnett was born in Melbourne in 1968 and is the author of several novels, having had her first, 'Trouble All the Way', published at the age of fifteen. Her titles published by Penguin include 'Wilful Blue' (1994), 'Sleeping Dogs' (1995), 'The Devil Latch' (1996), 'Black Foxes' (1996), 'Princes' (1997) and 'All My Dangerous Friends (1998).

'Wilful Blue', for which Hartnett received a writer's fellowship from the Literature Board of the Australia Council in 1992, was awarded the 1996 Ena Noel Award (International Board on Books for Young People). 'Sleeping Dogs' was the winner of the Sheaffer Pen Prize for Young Adult Fiction in the 1996 Victorian Premier's Awards, was an Honour Book in the 1996 Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Awards (Older Readers), received the 1996 Kathleen Mitchell Award, and was shortlisted for the 1996 NSW Premier's Literary Award.