Book description
Shortlisted for the 2010 Miles Franklin Award and the 2010 Prime
Minister s Literary Award, the Age Fiction Book of the Year. Winner of
the Dobbie Prize. A stunning first novel from a Melbourne author. The
story of the Brown family will wrench at your heart and make you hug
those you love ever tighter. Emmett Brown is as dark as Heathcliff, and
as unpredictable. Sometimes he's an inspiration, but not often. He's a
man of booze and obsessions: one of them is his 'System', an attempt to
bend the laws of probability. But when the lottery numbers and horses
fail him, so do love and reason, and he becomes an ogre to his wife and
children. For the innocents - Louisa, Rob, Peter, Daniel and Jessie -
the bonds formed hiding in hedges at the end of the street, waiting for
the maelstroms to pass, are complex and unbreakable. Over the years, the
consequences of Emmett's rages shape both their spirits and psyches, but
as he lies dying they discover that love - however imperfect - is the
best defence against pain. The Book of Emmett is a novel about hope and
love and surviving. Deborah Forster grew up in Footscray, Melbourne.
She worked as a staff and freelance journalist for many years and was a
This Life columnist on The Age and The Sunday Age. Deborah Foster is
married to Alan Kohler and they have three children. Her novels include
the Miles Franklin shortlisted The Book of Emmett and The Meaning of
Grace, shortlisted for the Age Fiction Book of the Year,
