The Twelfth Fish

The small rural Queensland town of Lawson is still reeling from the arrival of the 1990s and modernity. Surfie teacher Lawrence Lalor is condemned there to servitude y the Catholic Education League. From his veranda and the pub, he is quick to learn that while Lawson is just another 'dead-kangaroo-on-the-side-of-the-road' country town, with its streets named after saints, beneath its simple surface it is a town of depth and deception. Drunken mistakes, accidental friendships and the arcane practice dignity are more rare than precious. Lawrence's journey through Lawson - the supposed 'jewel of the west' - gouges a scar on his emotional landscape that will stay with him forever.