A new work of fiction by the author of Remembering Babylon. It is 1827, and, in a remote hut high on the plains of New South Wales, two strangers spend the night in talk. One, an illiterate Irishman, and ex-convict and bushranger, is to be hanged at dawn. The other is the police officer who has been sent to supervise the hanging. As the night wears on, the two men share memories and uncover unlikely connections between their lives. 240 pp. Author tour. 20,000 print. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Two men spend the night in a hut in the vast, bleak western highlands of Australia in 1827. One is a convicted felon, a captured member of a gang of outlaws working to foment a rebellion among the colony's oppressed natives. The other is his nemesis, an officer charged with hanging him at dawn. Through their halting conversations, the confluence of their very different lives takes on a mythic quality. Both are exiles from their native Ireland, though from different social strata. The prisoner, Daniel Carney, accepts his fate with stoic dignity, though he mourns the death of the leader of his band, a charismatic fellow known as Dolan. The military officer, Michael Adair, has reason to think that Dolan was really Fergus Connellan, his beloved boyhood friend and adoptive brother with whom he was raised on a beautiful estate. In a series of reflective flashbacks, Adair's relationship with Fergus is revealed, as well as Adair's love for Virgilia, a spirited young woman from a neighboring estate, who loves Fergus instead. Malouf relates his complex story slowly, with more interior monologues than direct action. The narrative acquires power as the deeply pessimistic Adair is forced to acknowledge the forces that have shaped his personality and that of his friends, and the consequences that now lie in wait. Malouf (The Great World; Remembering Babylon) raises existential questions about moral order and justice, depicts the contrast between rich and poor in Ireland and Australia and lyrically describes the landscapes of both countries and the spirits that abide there. The accretion of precise detail rewards the reader with resonating insights. And the surprising epilogue, with its two spiritual resurrections, offers a rich and satisfying denouement. Author tour. Copyright 1996 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

An Australian of Lebanese descent, Malouf (Remembering Babylon, LJ 8/93) has always written about outsiders. His latest effort, set in 19th-century Ireland and Australia, features two men at odds with the world even as fate sets them on opposite sides of the fence. Raised by a foster mother on an estate in Ireland that will never be his, officer Michael Adair has been sent to oversee the execution of Daniel Carney, an illiterate Irishman who is the last of a band of renegades suspected of planning to foment revolution. As the night wears on, the two men talk. Carney is looking for answers to the big questions in life, which Adair cannot give, and Adair is looking for information on the band's leader, possibly his missing foster brother, Fergus. Much of the novel is taken up with Adair's reflections on his youth with Fergus and neighbor Virgilia, a fond triangle eventually broken up by sexual tension and the different roles assigned to each by society. As usual, Malouf's breathtaking prose--both daring and absolutely apt--gets right to the heart of things. Malouf has a great gift for allowing us to feel life's uncertainty and our struggle to contain it. It's clear from this affecting novel why he recently won the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, the largest cash prize ever given an author. Highly recommended. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 9/1/96.]--Barbara Hoffert, "Library Journal"Copyright 1996 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

An esteemed Australian writer, whose previous novel was the very well received Remembering Babylon (1993), presents an intellectually rigorous novel set in his native country in the early nineteenth century. The plot is relatively simple: a criminal and a police officer spend one night in close confinement as they await the criminal's execution scheduled for the following morning. From this uncomplicated premise, Malouf spins a provocative meditation on the nature of freedom and the various ways it may be lost and gained. As the two men share aspects of their lives, although the officer remembers more about his own than he is willing to tell the other man, ideas about personal fulfillment emerge and collide and coalesce--ideas that have resonance in contemporary times. The splendid ending might even compel readers to clap their hands in applause. For all serious fiction lovers. (Reviewed December 1, 1996)0679442669Brad Hooper From: Syndetics Solutions, Inc. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.