'A story of belonging is always a story of losing.'
The original hardback design by Sandy Cull for The River Wife published by Allen & Unwin in 2009. It was later printed as a paperback and then redesigned in the new suite of novels by Sandy Cull for Allen & Unwin in 2025.
The River Wife holds stories within stories and they are all woven together with a compassionate and unique hand.”
Readings
…few Australians have chosen to write fables that take shape-changing as their central theme. The River Wife tells her story in intimate, seductive prose. A love story must engage readers and persuade them to believe as well. And this one does. The emotions are unfalteringly subtle and persuasive.”
Sydney Morning Herald
A cool and luscious fable of love … (with) all the hallmarks of the great love stories – passionate and tantalising, elegiac and profound. …there are echoes of Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales, Anna Livia." Plurabelle from James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake, and even Murray Bail’s Eucalyptus. Replete with sensuous, evocative language.”
Canberra Times
From the first pages of The River Wife, the reader is struck by the beauty of the prose. There is a fluid brook-like quality to the writing. (A celebration of) the beauty of nature and the enduring power of story.”
