'You walk and the harvest moon casts the clearest of shadows. You are nervous. With a moon like that, it is not a night for escaping. It is a night made better for hunting runaway girls.'

Himalayas: Unknown Year

'Ten thousand strands of trouble,' is what Bird's father says, watching as Bird's sister braids her hair. On the eve of her fourteenth year, that trouble finds Bird. Fleeing her home to escape an arranged marriage, she attempts to vanish into a crowd of pilgrims - not knowing that violence is circling, and that it already has its eyes on her. In search of her own life and her own truth, she could never imagine how long and how far it would take her.

Darwin: Present Day

Waking in a hospital bed, Bird tries to remember what brought her here. A man whose gaze she knew to fear, a stolen car, a plastic gun, and a real bullet in her shoulder. Kindness is being offered here, so why is her instinct always to run? Strand by strand, she begins to remember . . .

A masterful and profoundly moving novel about a girl determined to live on her own terms, no matter the cost. Bird is an unforgettable story of hope, resilience, the power of connection and the most elemental bonds.

'Reading Courtney Collins' writing is an experience akin to falling under the spell of a song. An evocative, enchanting storyteller.' HOLLY RINGLAND

'A magical, heartbreaking page-turner. In luminous prose, Courtney Collins explores the vagaries of growing up, the slipperiness of time and space, the complexities of family and friendship, creativity and self-determination. I loved it.' JENNIFER HIGGIE

'The Handmaid's Tale meets The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart . . . Bird tenderly explores womanhood intergenerationally through a lens of community, hope and resilience' BOOKS+PUBLISHING