The incredible true story behind the Booker Prize-shortlisted The Secret River from the Women's Prize-winning Australian novelist Kate Grenville

The story behind The Secret River

"A novel everyone should read." Irish Times

Shortlisted for the 2006 Man Booker Prize

In the summer of 2000, award-winning novelist Kate Grenville decided to open the closed door of her family history. Who was her great-great-great grandfather, Solomon Wiseman, a Thames boatman sent as a convict to Australia in 1806? The answers to this question were revelatory. From the bones of his life a novel slowly evolved: The Secret River.

This is the story of Grenville's investigation, a memoir of the writing process through false starts, wrong turns and exhilarating breakthroughs. It is a remarkable journey of discovery around the globe, across the generations and into fiction.

"Here is someone who can really write."
Peter Carey

*NEW NOVEL RESTLESS DOLLY MAUNDER SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2024*
FROM THE BOOKER PRIZE-SHORTLISTED AND WOMEN'S PRIZE-WINNING AUSTRALIAN NOVELIST

Kate Grenville's The Secret River was one of the most loved novels of 2006. Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and awarded the Commonwealth Writer's Prize, the story of William Thornhill and his journey from London to the other side of the world has moved and exhilarated hundreds of thousands of readers.

Searching for the Secret River tells the story of how Grenville came to write this wonderful book. It is in itself an amazing story, beginning with Grenville's great-great-great grandfather. Grenville starts to investigate her ancestor, hoping to understand his life. She pursues him from Sydney to London and back, and slowly she begins to realise she must write about him. Searching for the Secret River maps this creative journey into fiction, and illuminates the importance of family in all our lives.