ISBN: 9780645151428
eISBN: 9780645151435
312 pages
Little Wins Press, 2022
First published by Penguin Books (Australia), 2009
Raw Blue
Kirsty Eagar
Winner, The Victorian Premier's Literary Awards
Shortlisted, The Gold Inky
A Readings Book of the Year
ABR Best Books of the Year: Critics' Choices
A new edition of the cult favourite influenced by its feature film adaptation.
Carly works nights as a cook, so she can spend her days surfing, scratching to get waves at a territorial break. She’s moved there to be alone, but surprises herself by making two new friends. Hannah, her salsa-mad neighbour. And Danny, a young surfer who sees people in colours. But when Carly collides with local boy Ryan, she’s forced to confront her history.
Is just surviving enough? Or is she brave enough to live?
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Reviews
A book that shakes your foundations and rewrites how you see the world—and your place in it. That was Raw Blue for me … It signalled a shift in Australian youth literature to something truly extraordinary, honest and vital. A symbiosis of the times changing and an author coming along and cracking everything wide open to let the truth in. A book that I know gifted female readers with the space to both feel seen, and the permission to be angry … I owe her a debt of gratitude, and I think readers in this country do too.
One of those kept-me-up-all-night novels that stays in your bones and sings in your ears long after you’ve finished it. It wouldn’t be out of place next to Tim Winton’s Breath, except this is the ocean as healer, not as an object to be conquered, or the site of self-destruction … The images crackle, the lines are full of the poetry of observation, the story is searing, gutting, beautiful.
Quietly devastating and achingly hopeful, Raw Blue is unforgettable. It’s my favourite book.
Kirsty Eagar’s fearless Raw Blue, a story of regeneration set on Sydney’s northern beaches, is much more than a promising debut: this one delivers.
It’s an emotionally rich and powerful first novel, and Kirsty Eagar is a writer to watch.
Eagar’s first novel explores dark territory with skill and sensitivity.
I read this book feverishly. Eagar gives victims a voice.
Full of a range of emotions, expressed honestly and without fear. The characters are believable and real, awkward and endearing. A compelling first novel from an exciting new Australian author.
A gutsy and nuanced story … you must read this book.
It’s dark subject matter, but Eagar makes it uplifting.
A powerful, raw and beautiful novel.