An Open Swimmer
by Tim Winton
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Description
Jerra and his best mate Sean set off in a beaten-up old VW to go camping on the coast. Jerra's friends and family want to know when he will finish university, when he will find a girl. But they don't understand about Sean's mother, Jewel, or the bush or the fish with the pearl. They think he needs a job, but what Jerra is searching for is more elusive. Only the sea, and perhaps the old man who lives in a shack beside it, can help.Tags
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Member Reviews
Hard to get into story about two friends who aren't getting on so well after they leave school. They go on a fishing holiday on an abandoned area only to find that a hermit lives there. There's a secret that drives the two apart and causes real difficulties for one of the friends. Things are slowly unveiled as the story goes on, but if anything things get even more complicated.
Typical Winton. Some great language and vivid descriptions of fishing. Very Australian. Not as good as his latest - Breath.
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Author Information
42+ Works 13,832 Members
Tim Winton was born in 1960 in Western Australia. He attended a Creative Writing Course at Curtin University in Perth, and it was there that he began his first novel, An Open Swimmer. It was entered for The Australian/Vogel Award in 1981 and won. His other works include Shallows, which won the Miles Franklin Award in 1984; The Riders Winton, which show more won the Miles Franklin Award in 1992; and Island Home: A Landscape Memoir, the winner of the 2016 Australian Book Industry Awards, General nonfiction book of the year. The Boy Behind the Curtain, published in 2016, won the 2018 Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature, Nonfiction. His books also include The Shepherd's Hut, Breath, and Dirt Music. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Awards
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Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1981
- Important places
- Australia; Western Australia, Australia
- Original language
- English
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Statistics
- Members
- 171
- Popularity
- 191,459
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.34)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 24
- ASINs
- 3
