From the acclaimed author of the “exquisitely written and deeply felt” (Geraldine Brooks, author of The Secret Chord) novel The Railwayman’s Wife comes a magical and gorgeously wrought tale of an astonishing event that connects three people across three hundred years. Imagine you looked up at just the right moment and saw something completely unexpected. What if it was something so marvelous that it transformed time and space forever? The Body in the Clouds tells the story of one such extraordinary moment—a man falling from the sky, and surviving—and of the three men who see it, in different ways and at different times, as they stand on the same piece of land. An astronomer in the 1700s, a bridge worker in the 1930s, and an expatriate banker returning home in the early twenty-first century: all three are transformed by this one magical event. And all three are struggling to understand what the meaning of “home” is, and how to recognize it once you’re there. Widely praised for her “poetic gifts” (Booklist) and “graceful, supremely honest, [and] thought-provoking” (Kirkus Reviews) prose, Ashley Hay has crafted a luminous and unforgettable novel about the power of story, its ability to define the world around us, and the questions that transcend time.
Author
Ashley Hay’s new novel, A Hundred Small Lessons, was published in Australia, the US and the UK and was shortlisted for categories in the 2017 Queensland Literary Awards. Set in her new home city of Brisbane, it traces the intertwined lives of two women from different generations through a story of love, and of life. It takes account of what it means to be mother or daughter; father or son and tells a rich and intimate story of how we feel what it is to be human, and how place can transform who we are. Her previous novel, The Railwayman’s Wife, was published in Australia, the UK, the US, and is heading for translation into Italian, French and Dutch. It won the Colin Roderick Prize (awarded by the Foundation for Australian Literary Studies), as well as the People's Choice award in the 2014 NSW Premier's Prize, and was also longlisted for both the Miles Franklin and Nita B. Kibble awards. Her first novel, The Body in the Clouds (2010), was shortlisted for categories in the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and the NSW and WA premier’s prizes, and longlisted for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Her previous books span fiction and non-fiction and include Gum: The Story of Eucalypts and Their Champions (2002), Museum (2007; with visual artist Robyn Stacey), and Best Australian Science Writing 2014 (as editor)s A writer for more than 20 years, her essays and short stories have appeared in volumes including the Griffith Review, Best Australian Essays (2003), Best Australian Short Stories (2012), and Best Australian Science Writing (2012), and have been awarded various accolades in Australia and overseas. In 2016, she received the Bragg UNSW Press Prize for Science Writing.
