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Nine Days
Published 20 November 2013
ISBN 9781922147691
Format Paperback
Extent 304pp
AU Price $22.99
NZ Price $30.00

Nine Days

Formats & editions
Paperback
20 Nov 2013
EBook
22 Aug 2012
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One family. Nine momentous days. An unforgettable novel of love and folly and heartbreak.

It is 1939 and although Australia is about to go to war, it doesn't quite realise yet that the situation is serious.

Deep in the working-class Melbourne suburb of Richmond it is business—your own and everyone else's—as usual. And young Kip Westaway, failed scholar and stablehand, is living the most important day of his life.

Kip's momentous day is one of nine that will set the course for each member of the Westaway clan in the years that follow. Kip's mother, his brother Francis and, eventually, Kip's wife Annabel and their daughters and grandson: all find their own turning points, their triumphs and catastrophes, in days to come.

But at the heart of all their stories is Kip, and at the centre of Kip's fifteen-year-old heart is his adored sister Connie. They hold the threads that will weave a family.

In Nine Days Toni Jordan has harnessed all the spiky wit, compassion and lust for life that drew readers in droves to Addition and Fall Girl. Ambitious in scope and structure, triumphantly realised, this is a novel about one family and every family. It is about dreams and fights and sacrifices. And finally, of course, it is—as it must be—about love.
Published 20 November 2013
ISBN 9781922147691
Format Paperback
Extent 304pp
AU Price $22.99
NZ Price $30.00

About the author

Toni Jordan

Toni Jordan was born in Brisbane and now lives in Melbourne. She has qualifications in science, marketing and professional writing. Her first novel Addition was published by Text in 2008 and has been sold into eleven countries world-wide. It was shortlisted for Best Fiction book and Newcomer of the Year at the 2008 ABIA awards and was awarded Indie Book of the Year award for Fiction. Toni now lives in Melbourne where she works as a freelance copywriter.
portrait photo of Toni Jordan

Also by Toni Jordan

Addition
The Fragments
Our Tiny, Useless Hearts
See all

Praise for Nine Days

Simply a joy to read

Courier-Mail

Toni Jordan has written a beautiful novel which captures the loves and fears of an ordinary Australian family through hard times and better times. It reminded me of Elizabeth Stead's books

Australian Bookseller & Publisher

What makes a book good is its heart – and the heart of this book is warm but real. Its particular subjects are war, abortion, religious and class difference, social conscience and social mobility, but it is also a universal tale about how love (marital, romantic, sibling, parental, and so on) forms the glue that keeps us going

Whispering Gums

Jordan is clear that what binds us to one another and to a meaningful life is simply valuing the life you have been given and the family that is yours and yours alone. Reading Nine Days, you will laugh, even cry, but you will be in no doubt that Toni Jordan uses the modern novel to reflect those tensions that exist for many of us between duty and desire

Australian Book Review

A brilliant piece of writing . . . compelling, engaging and will bring tears to the eyes . . .

Sunday Star Times

Toni Jordan's characters beautifully frame a story of compassion, fun and poignancy

Launceston Examiner

Every now and then a book comes along that's brilliantly conceived and tightly written, yet there's nothing flashy about it. I think Australian writer Toni Jordan's third novel, Nine Days, falls into the rare and wonderful category . . . Each of the nine voices is distinct and brimming with personality and by the finish every part of the jigsaw fits perfectly and you see the whole sweep of this romantic, thoughtful, heartbreaking story . . . Jordan's previous novels, Addition and Fall Girl, were smart sassy and humourous. Nine Days has taken her to another level. More serious than her previous work but with the same astute observations, brightness and wit, its a sensitive and beautiful novel, a slice of Australia's working-class history, that is a joy to read

NZ Herald on Sunday

This novel is a triumph. Another signal career in Australian fiction is well under way

Australian

Jordan's triumph is in the structure and scope of this novel set in working-class Richmond, starting and ending indeed in 1939 but spreading out an ensuing 70 years to solve a mystery and build a love story

Adelaide Advertiser

The suspense is frequently nail-biting, and there's a strong undertow of unspecified doom, but the book is far from gloomy because Jordan has a fine line in wit too, not to mention the natural storyteller's ability to keep us guessing about where it's all going . . . beautifully constructed . . .

Daily Mail UK