Death Of A River Guide

This first novel combines the narrative ingenuity of Golding's Pincher Martin with the imaginative detail of De Bernieres' Captain Corelli. It's a torrent of a book - take the plunge --Independent
Death of a River Guide defies superlatives. It is that rare commodity - a wonderful fiction which has pace, depth of feeling, and infinite imaginative possibilities --Scotland on Sunday
One of the most auspicious debuts in Australian writing --TLS
Combines a rich voice, highly original, with great invention and engrossing narrative pace... very, very good indeed --Thomas Keneally
Richard Flanagan's first novel could well become a classic, doing for Tasmania what Gabriel Garcia Márquez did for Colombia or William Faulkner did for Mississippi --Mercury (Tasmania)

THE WINNER OF THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2014'S MAGNIFICENT FIRST NOVEL

Beneath a waterfall on the Franklin, Aljaz Cosini, river guide, lies drowning. Beset by visions at once horrible and fabulous, he relives not just his own life but that of his family and forebears. In the rainforest waters that rush over him he sees those lives stripped bare of their surface realities, and finds a world where dreaming reasserts its power over thinking. As the river rises his visions grow more turbulent, and in the flood of the past Aljaz discovers the soul of his country.