Cloudwish (24 page)

Fiona Wood

Wildlife

Life? It's simple: be true to yourself.

The tricky part is finding out exactly who you are . . .

In the holidays before the dreaded term at Crowthorne Grammar's outdoor education camp two things out of the ordinary happened.

A picture of me was plastered all over a twenty-metre billboard.

And I kissed Ben Capaldi.

Boarding for a term in the wilderness, sixteen-year-old Sibylla expects the gruesome outdoor education program – but friendship complications, and love that goes wrong? They're extra-curricula.

Enter Lou from
Six Impossible Things
– the reluctant new girl for this term in the great outdoors. Fragile behind an implacable mask, she is grieving a death that occurred almost a year ago. Despite herself, Lou becomes intrigued by the unfolding drama between her housemates Sibylla and Holly, and has to decide whether to end her self-imposed detachment and join the fray.

And as Sibylla confronts a tangle of betrayal, she needs to renegotiate everything she thought she knew about surviving in the wild.

A story about first love, friends
hip and NOT fitting in.

'A beautifully crafted novel with achingly real characters that I couldn't get out of my head.'

Melina Marchetta

Praise for
Wildlife

‘Enchanting . . . Wood tackles the big themes head-on: identity, friendship, justice, love, death. Her characters are all compelling and believable . . .'

New York Times Book Review

‘Relationship dynamics and the shock of death are explored with heart, but most refreshing is the rational way in which teen sex is treated.'

The Age, Spectrum

‘. . . Wood's writing is contemporary cool. The writing style has the lucidity and economy of a verse novel, but one set in prose.'

Weekend Australian

‘Wood has captured real teen emotion and soul while conveying positive messages about dealing with the stuff of life – friendship, betrayal, love, loss and sex.'

Reading Time

‘Wood's understanding of teenage voice shines in this dual account of unlikely friendship. Fresh, funny, and heartbreaking . . .'

VOYA (starred review)

‘With exceptional candor, honesty, and nuance, Wood tells a heartening and compelling story of the importance of agency, self-confidence, and true friendship.'

Booklist (starred review)

First published 2015 in Macmillan by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd

1 Market Street, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 2000

Copyright © Fiona Wood 2015

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

This ebook may not include illustrations and/or photographs that may have been in the print edition.

Cataloguing-in-Publication entry is available

from the National Library of Australia

http://catalogue.nla.gov.au

EPUB format: 9781743539859

Typeset by Post Pre-press Group

Cover design: Sandy Cull, gogo:Gingko

Cover images: Getty Images, Shutterstock

The characters in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons,

living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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