by Zena Shapter

PB 400 | 198 x 129 | ISBN: 9781922858061 | $19.99
Young Adult | Also available as ebook
MidnightSun Publishing | 20 May 2023
Distributed by NewSouth Books

Don’t go out onto the lake. Wyann trees search the shallows to spear passing prey with their roots. Giant water-ants hunt anything that moves on the water-skin. Sala’s village survives hidden behind a wall of poisonous ivy, because everyone agrees: don’t go out onto the lake.

But then a strange comet crosses the night sky, throwing Sala and her pet pointer into a race through wyann-infested swampland that has her risking it all, unearthing long-hidden truths and stirring rivalries into a terrifying conflict set to change the world of Palude forever. Sala must do whatever it takes to face the truth of who she is: to save her village, to save her family, to save herself.

If only they had listened.

‘A rich and thrilling read. Shapter has created an intriguing new world filled with luminous beauty, exotic dangers, and unsettlingly familiar aging tech, where the heroine must navigate strange cultural and political tensions and wrestle with the consequences of her own tangled ambitions.’
Leife Shallcross, The Beast’s Heart

‘Shapter has created an immersive, fantastical world with tension poised to snap at any moment. I couldn’t put it down.’
USA Today bestselling author Dionne Lister, The Circle of Talia

‘A great read - fresh, action-packed and utterly compelling. I loved it.’
Ian Irvine, internationally bestselling author of The Gates of Good and Evil series

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