Eucalyptus (1999 Winner Of Commonwealth Writer's Prize)

Description: On a property in New South Wales, a man named Holland lives with his daughter Ellen. As years pass and Ellen grows into a beautiful young woman, her father announces his decision: she will marry the first man who can name all the species of the eucalypt, down to the last tree.

Review: "One of the great and most surprising courtships in literature" -- Michael Ondaatje "Bail tells a story which is encrusted with delicious detail, and writes in an affecting mood of rapt tenderness. The book will haunt its readers long after more perfectly-finished fictions have faded from their memories" -- Andrew Motion Observer "Tall trees inspire tall tales. Eucalyptus makes most other novels seem weedy by comparison. It is a towering achievement" -- Mark Sanderson Time Out "His sentences have a perpetually off-balance wit which gives you life's jumble, its mystery, its unexplained compactness. You take in the humour first, but then they deepen and deepen. Buy the book. You won't have read anything like it" -- Francis Spufford Evening Standard "A most unusual, enchanting work...a novel of most beguiling originality" -- Carmen Callil Daily Telegraph



Prizes: Winner of The Commonwealth Writers Prize 1999 and The Commonwealth Writer's Prize Best Book South East Asia and South Pacific 1999. Shortlisted for Miles Franklin Literary Award 1999 and Victorian Premier's Literary Award - Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction 1999 and APA Design Awards: Australian Paper Best Designed Hardback 1998 and Book Data/ABA Book of the Year Award 1998.

Author Biography: Murray Bail was born in Adelaide in 1941, and now lives in Sydney. His first novel, Homesickness, won the National Book Award for Australian Literature and the Melbourne Age Book of the Year Award. His subsequent novel, Holden's Performance, won the Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction. His non-fiction includes an acclaimed monograph on the work of the painter Ian Fairweather.