The Lost Dog

Tom Loxley is holed up in a remote cottage in the bush, trying to finish a book on Henry James and the Uncanny when his dog goes missing, trailing a length of orange twine, tied with firm knots. Tom's lonely childhood in India taught him to tie knots but not to hold on...The house belongs to Nelly Zhang, an elusive artist with whom Tom has become enthralled. The narrative spans ten days while Tom searches for his dog...and loops back in time to take the reader on a breathtaking journey into glittering worlds far beyond the present tragedy, from an Anglo-Indian childhood to the brittle contemporary Melbourne art scene, from Tom's scratchy, unbearably poignant relationship with his ailing mother to the unanswered puzzles in Nelly's past - her husband also disappeared in the bush.And the reader fears for Tom as well as for the dog.

Set in present-day Australia and mid-20th century India, here is a haunting, layered work that vividly counterpoints new cityscapes and their inhabitants with the untamed, ancient continent beyond. With its atmosphere of menace and an acute sense of the unexplained in any story, it illuminates the collision of the wild and the civilised, modernity and the past, home and exile. "The Lost Dog" is a mystery and a love story, an exploration of art and nature, a meditation on ageing and the passage of time.

It is a book of wonders: a gripping contemporary novel which examines the weight of history as well as different ways of trying to grasp the world.

About The Author

Michelle de Kretser was born in Sri Lanka and emigrated to Australia when she was 14. Having studied French at Melbourne University, she spent a year teaching in Montpellier before doing an MA in Paris. She has worked for many years as an editor at Lonely Planet Publications and was responsible for setting up their French series. Her first novel, THE ROSE GROWER, was published to great acclaim around the world and was a critical and commercial success in Australia. THE HAMILTON CASE was shortlisted for the SA Premier’s Fiction Award, the Victorian Premier’s Award, and was announced the Regional Winner of the 2004 Commonwealth Prize.