Cirrus@Austlit

'One lucky day will change two women's lives - but for better or worse?

'When an unexpected windfall brings together strangers Shauna and Frankie, one woman is popping champagne corks-but the other just wants to cry. For her part, Shauna is pouring celebratory drinks. Since her heart was broken and her dreams shattered, she's been ready for a fresh start. Surely she deserves some good luck at last? But Frankie knows what can happen to families when money moves in and is allowed to take over. Fearing she'll lose the contented-if cash-strapped-life she has built with her husband and their two daughters, she wants to be in control this time. But as money rewrites their life stories and truths emerge among the treasure, both are forced to wonder if their good fortune is just bad luck in disguise...'

Source : publisher's blurb

'The city I grew up in was elastic and belonged to me and my friends as we stretched it through the nights. We knew its contours, and when something new arrived we were among the first to be a part of it. Everything was powder pink and bendy and shiny for us. We hadn’t had time to build a lasting memory around some fixture and then watch that time fall away from under us.

'A group of friends moves into a share house in Redfern. They are all on the cusp of thirty and big life changes, navigating insecure employment and housing, second-generation identity, online dating and social alienation—and one of them, our narrator, has just lost her father.

'How do you inhabit a space where the landscape is shifting around you, when your sense of self is unravelling? What meaning does time have in the midst of grief?

'Through emotionally rich vignettes, tinged with humour, Friends & Dark Shapes sketches the contours of contemporary life. It is a novel of love and loss, of constancy and change. Most of all, it is about looking for connection in an estranged world.' (Publication summary)

'Are some white lies simply too big to forgive?

'Eve and Leah are identical twins—but beyond that, they’re polar opposites. Struggling journalist Leah envies Eve’s seemingly perfect life—the loyal husband, the beautiful twin daughters, the stellar career—little knowing that what Eve longs for most is Leah’s independence.

'When a shocking event upends their world, one woman seizes a split-second chance to change everything and follow her sister down a different life path. It’s a spontaneous choice, but there’s no going back. How will she deal with the fallout when covering up one untruth means lying to everyone—about everything?

'One thing is clear: both twins have secrets, and both just want to be happy. But what price will they pay to live the life they’ve always wanted?'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'“Victoria, will you marry me?”

'Those words changed my life forever…just not in the way it would for most. I had it all until one fateful evening transformed my life in ways I never imagined.

'Nine months later, I move to a sleepy little town, hoping to escape the demons of my past. As I attempt to claim back my life, Jude Montgomery enters my world, and things begin to change.

'I thought running would appease the nightmares, but I soon discover my past won’t let go. Things are not what they seem, and I begin to question the world as I know it. Jude may hold the answers, but will my love for him blind me to the truth?

'Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas? In my case, yes, it does.

'Will the truth set me free? Or will it imprison us both?

'My name is Victoria Armstrong, and this is my story…I think.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.