What the Family Needed

0.0

Okay, tell me which do you want: to be able to fly or to be invisible?' So seven-year-old Alek asks his cousin Giordana, though neither can know where the answer will lead. Family life is tough, and the lives in What the Family Needed are as full of trials, joys, loss and tribulation as any others. But at the moment of greatest need, each of these lives is touched by surprising strengths, by extraordinary gifts, by a strange sort of magic. From a sexually curious teenager to a septuagenarian widower to a middle-aged exile, we read about their secrets over thirty years. At the centre of it all is Alek, the enabler and catalyst for the tale of a family finding itself, as they discover powers they never thought possible. What the Family Needed is an uplifting and mesmerisingly original novel about how much each person needs in order to change their life, and what the family needs in order to survive.

0.0

Steven Amsterdam was born in New York and has worked as a map editor, producer's assistant, and a pastry chef. He has lived in Melbourne, Australia since 2003, where he works as a writer and palliative care nurse. His debut novel, Things We Didn't See Coming, won The Age Book of the Year in Australia and was longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award.