Books by Felicity Castagna

Rosa was never really trying to kill anyone, no matter what they said in court. But she's ended up in juvenile jail anyway, living her life through books and wondering why her best mate Asheeka disappeared. A page-turning novel about a complicated friendship; a road trip through ...NSW in a stolen car; the stories that define us; and two funny, sharp, adventurous young women who refuse to be held back any longer.
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New novel by Felicity Castagna, whose previous book, The Incredible Here and Now, won the 2015 Prime Ministers Award for Young Adult Fiction and was shortlisted for the CBCA and NSW Premier's Literary Awards. The subject is very topical. No More Boats tackles the fear of refugees... head on, portraying the anxieties of a man who was once a migrant himself, brought to breaking point by the Tampa crisis, when the nation itself is thrown into a xenophobic frame of mind. It is 2001. 438 refugees sit in a boat called Tampa off the shoreline of Australia while the TV and radio scream out that the country is being flooded, inundated, overrun by migrants. Antonio Martone, once a migrant himself, has been forced to retire, his wife has moved in with the woman next door, his daughter runs off with strange men, his deadbeat son is hiding in the garden smoking marijuana. Amidst his growing paranoia, the ghost of his dead friend shows up and commands him to paint 'No More Boats' in giant letters across his front yard. The Prime Minister of Australia keeps telling Antonio that we will decide who comes to this country and the circumstance in which they come, but Antonio's not sure he wants to think about all those things that led him to get on a boat and come to Australia in the first place. A man and a nation unravel together. Felicity Castagna is the author of the award-winning novel The Incredible Here and Now,and its stage adaptation which will premiere at The National Theatre of Parramatta in 2017. Her collection of short stories Small Indiscretions was named an ABR book of the year. Her work has appeared on ABC Radio and TV as well as in national journals and newspapers. She holds a PhD from Western Sydney University and has served as the National Ambassador for Literacy and as a director at WestWords. She runs the storytelling series Studio Stories. 'It is exciting to read a work of fiction that makes an explicit connection between its characters' personal narratives and the s
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That's what West is: shiny cars and loud things, people coming, people going-movement. Those who don't know any better, they come in to the neighbourhood and lock their windows and drive on through, never stopping before they get somewhere else. Charcoal chicken, a white Pontiac ...Trans Am, the Council pool. Michael is living in the shadow of his older brother Dom. The biggest guy in the school. Best car in the West. The guy who just can't help but grab everyone's attention. The guy with the girlfriend with the huge-arse hair. When he is gone Michael roams the streets, navigating life, friendship, love and family.
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Michael's older brother dies at the beginning of the summer he turns 15, but as its title suggests The Incredible Here and Now is a tale of wonder, not of tragedy. Presented as a series of vignettes, in the tradition of Sandra Cisneros' Young Adult classic The House on Mango Stre...et, it tells of Michael's coming of age in a year which brings him grief and romance; and of the place he lives in Western Sydney where 'those who don't know any better drive through the neighbourhood and lock their car doors', and those who do, flourish in its mix of cultures. Through his perceptions, the reader becomes familiar with Michael's community and its surroundings, the unsettled life of his family, the girl he meets at the local pool, the friends that gather in the McDonalds parking lot at night, the white Pontiac Trans Am that lights up his life like a magical talisman.
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Both a gripping family drama and a timely meditation on borders, the media, and immigration, No More Boats tells a universal story about fitting in and feeling threatened.