This Kingdom of Dust

Shortlisted for THE AGE Book of the Year.

'Pacy, exciting and often unexpectedly moving storytelling.'
THE AUSTRALIAN

'Is this all?'
That's the question Joan asks as she surveys her neat, suburban home and her perfect children. It's July 1969 and her husband Buzz is walking on the Moon. In Houston, Joan folds laundry and smiles for the cameras.
Outside, the world is on fire- assassinations, Vietnam, civil rights and women demanding to be heard. But Joan is safe inside her shiny kitchen and NASA tells her she should be Proud, Thrilled and Happy.
Then something goes wrong. Buzz and Neil become stranded on the Moon in their spacecraft. Its single engine has failed and they can't take off. NASA scrambles to find a solution and the world holds its breath. Joan waits patiently.
But she's waited long enough.
In this audacious reimagining of one of the 20th century's most iconic events, it's the men who are trapped and the women who find the courage to reach for something more.
As the world watches the sky, a quiet revolution begins at home.