True History of the Kelly Gang: A Novel

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE, starring George MacKay, Essie Davis, Nicholas Hoult, Charlie Hunnam, and Russell Crowe.

The international bestseller, Booker Prize winner, and winner of the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Book.

Out of 19th century Australia rides a hero of his people and a man for all nations: Ned Kelly, the son of poor Irish immigrants, viewed by the authorities as a thief (especially of horses) and, as a cold-blooded killer. To the people, though, he was a patriot hounded unfairly by rich English landlords and their stooges. In the end, Kelly and his so-called gang (his younger brother and two friends) led a massive police manhunt on a wild goose chase that lasted twenty months, in which Ned’s talents as a bushman were augmented by bank robberies and the support of nearly everyone not in a uniform. His one demand—for which he would have surrendered himself—was his jailed mother’s freedom.

Speaking as if from the grave, Kelly still resonates as the most potent legend in the land down under.