The Sunken Road

The Sunken Road is many roads, taking different paths through the terrain of a life, a family, a history and a region. It is a road called Loss, a road called Secrets, a road called Love—and a road called Sunken. Lyrical, expansive and profoundly moving, this is a novel like no other.

The town of Pandowie in the mid-north of South Australia has been shaped for generations by two families, the Isons and the Showalters. At their conjunction lies a tragedy that cannot be glimpsed directly but sits at the centre of Anna Tolley’s long life, pulling at her past and future. Anna’s story and all her secrets are exposed through a series of prisms, drawing themes and connections from her life and her surroundings, each revealing a different facet and combining into a tender and devastating whole.