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Extracts

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The Prisoner's Wife

This incredible story was related by Lance Corporal Sidney Reed, who was a prisoner of the Nazis during the Second World War at Lamsdorf, Stalag VIIIB / 344, in Poland, and at the labour camp E166 at Saubsdorf quarry, Czechoslovakia.

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Queen Bee

Am I really going to do this?

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Enter the Aardvark

– a whirling mass of vapors is unhinged, shooting through outer space for an infinity until it collides with an ellipsis which does not let go, and after another infinity, the vapors boil into fire clouds...

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Keeper

Death? Seen him. Loads of times. Average height. Brownish hair. Couldn’t tell you what colour his eyes are but I can tell you he’s nothing special to look at.

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Away with the Penguins

I have told Eileen to get rid of all the mirrors. I used to like them but I certainly don’t now. Mirrors are too honest. There is only so much truth a woman can take.

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Sharks in the Time of Saviours

When I close my eyes we’re all still alive and it becomes obvious then what the gods want from us.

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Party Animals

Bill Shorten had grand ambitions to become Australia’s next Bob Hawke.

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The Origin of Me

According to family lore, exactly forty weeks after my father won the prestigious and fiercely contested GravyLog® Pet Food account for his advertising agency, I was born.

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The Cedar Tree

Stella came from over the mountains. From a place battered by the lash of the wind and buffeted by the lifting soil.

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The Lost Love Song

The love song began its life, not with a fanfare or a crash of cymbals, but instead with a knock at a door.

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Separation Anxiety

I start wearing the family dog, a mini-sheltie, a little Lassie, in an unbleached cotton baby sling across the front of my body like a messenger bag, a few weeks shy of fall.

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Journey of the Pharaohs

Heat shimmered in waves across the Valley of the Kings as the merciless sun baked the desert sands into clay.

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20th Victim

Cindy Thomas was tuned in to her police scanner as she drove through the Friday-morning rush to her job at the San Francisco Chronicle.

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The Boy from the Woods

In one of the most bizarre cases in recent history, a wild-haired young boy, estimated to be between six and eight years old, was discovered living on his own in the Ramapo Mountain State Forest near the suburb of Westville.

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Sweetness and Light

India – although it could just as easily be Thailand, or Cambodia, or Colombia.

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The Banksia Bay Beach Shack

Laura rearranged the hydrangeas that adorned the end of each pew.

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The Authenticity Project

She had tried to return the book. As soon as she realized it had been left behind, she’d picked it up and rushed after its extraordinary owner.

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The Coconut Children

The full moon floats in the night sky like a cataract.

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Ali Cross

It had been three days since my friend disappeared and I was starting to think the worst might have happened.

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The Second Wife

It’s past midnight and the lights along the pier are jumping points of static, reflected in silver glimmers on the sea.

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The Two Lives of Lydia Bird

Most of life’s defining moments happen unexpectedly; sometimes they slide past you completely unnoticed until afterwards, if at all.

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The Recovery of Rose Gold

My daughter didn’t have to testify against me. She chose to.

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Watching from the Dark

Something clicked in the house and he froze, looking towards the closed door, his heart racing. Had it been the front door? Had someone come in?

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Into the Fire

The industrial sliding doors heaved open to a burst of bitter alpine air, a dizzying flurry of snow, and a barrage of hoarse cries

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