Cirrus@Austlit

'Delve into the many lives of Henry Savery, Australia's first novelist, described by Tom Keneally as 'a man whose own story is as picaresque as anything inside the covers of the novel'.

'Born to fortune but spurned by fate, a single act of folly launches young Henry into an extraordinary spiral of calamity. Banished to the end of the earth, bankrupt and betrayed, denied even the sanctuary of death, he surveys the gothic ruins of his past from an empty Hobart Town gaol cell and begins pouring out the story of his tortured journey - conjuring a thinly veiled autobiography that will become Australia's first published novel.

'Henry had long considered literature the best employment for a man of his talents and education. His catastrophic failings in every other endeavour confirmed it. But the final twist is yet to come.

'The facts of Henry Savery's tumultuous life are the equal of any fiction. Rod Howard's rollercoaster tale - epic in scale and rich in historical insight - is the untold story of a life cruelled by misjudgement and misfortune, and the educated felon who played a part in the birth of Australia's free press.' (Publication summary)