Rocks in the belly - Jon Bauer

You're eight years old. An only child. You love your parents, but you're convinced you're not enough for your mother because she fosters other people's kids. You've learnt to cope, just about, with how this makes you feel -- but then a boy called Robert arrives, and he and your Mum seem to connect in a way you never have. You hate him for it. And her. And one day you do something really bad to teach them both a lesson.At twenty-eight, you return home to face your mother, who is now chronically ill. Despite the intervening years, you haven't forgiven her - or yourself - for what happened. Ultimately, though, it's her forgiveness you crave, even after all this time - because you need to know, finally, that you were enough for her.

Jon Bauer was born in Surrey but now lives in Australia. He has written short stories and plays for stage and radio. Rocks in the Belly, his first novel, was shortlisted for the IMPAC Prize, the Miles Franklin Award and won the Indie Fiction Award in Australia.

Gripping reading . . . This is a largely tragic book, but it speaks in a mesmerising voice a brutal truth about the intensity of family relationships
Sunday Telegraph

Intelligent and funny
J M Coetzee

Bauer tells his dark, psychological story obliquely and with dramatic precision . . . What dazzles most is Bauer's eye for physical and emotional detail.
Sydney Morning Herald

A powerful first novel... Bauer expertly shifts voices between narrators... and provides properly complex answers to some fundamental questions.
Guardian - John O'Connell