Stealing Stacey - Lynne Reid Banks

A compelling and touching coming-of-age story set in the magnificent Australian outback.

All my helpless, angry thoughts suddenly came together to form one word.
One answer.
Australia.
On the other side of the world.
An escape from everything.

Stacey's life's not great. Her dad's run off, she and her mum live alone in a poky flat, school's one big bore and her friends are all bad news. Then, out of the blue, a glamorous gran she's never met comes to visit - all the way from Australia. When Stacey gets the worst news yet, Grandma Glendine has the perfect solution.

Suddenly, Stacey's life in grey old London is swapped for the heat, dust, flies, and even scorpions and snakes, of the outback. Will all this (plus - yuck! - an outside toilet) prove too much for Stacey the city-girl? And is her flashy, rich gran quite who she seems.?

An accessible, beautifully researched novel, written by an author who always tells a cracking good story.