The Last Thread

This poignant, haunting and beautiful novel retells Michael Sala's fascinating life through fiction. From his early years in the Netherlands to moving (twice) to Australia in the 1980s, ‘Michaelis' recalls the mysterious secret surrounding his estranged father, the relentless bullying of his stepfather, his mother's cheerful apathy, and his own struggles to fit into a world that often made no sense. With breathtaking prose, reminiscent of the great autobiographical novels of JM Coetzee and Michael Ondaatje, The Last Thread is the work of an exceptional new Australian writer. "I'm writing about my life, my immigrant family and all our failures, secrets and successes - there's a lot of heartache in there, memories that are painful and even shameful to recall. But writing The Last Thread has also been a joy, and I hope readers find things that are both strange and familiar in my depiction of being a kid growing up in Holland and moving to Australia. But as much as it's a memoir, this is a novel about what it means to be a man, as well as reflecting on the nature of memory - how we flesh together all those pieces of the past into a life story. - Michael Sala