Top 5 books set in Australia

When Ellie and her friends return from a camping trip in the Australian bush, they find things hideously wrong — their families are gone.

Gradually they begin to comprehend that their country has been invaded and everyone in their town has been taken prisoner. As the reality of the situation hits them, they must make a decision — run and hide, give themselves up and be with their families, or fight back.

They’ve got no weapons — except courage.
They’ve got no help — except themselves.
And they’ve got nothing — except friendship.

How strong can you be, when the world is full of people trying to kill you?

“And what’s this about you and your friends driving around Bondi Junction last week?”

“Who told you that?”

“Signora Formosa saw you. She said you and your friends almost ran her over. She rang Zia Patrizia’s next-door neighbour and it got back to Nonna.”

Telecom would go broke if it weren’t for the Italians.

For as long as Josephine can remember, it’s just been her, her mom, and her grandmother. Now it’s her final year at a wealthy Catholic high school. The nuns couldn’t be any stricter — but that doesn’t seem to stop all kinds of men from coming into her life.

Josephine Alibrandi is seventeen and illegitimate. This is the year her father comes back into her life, the year she falls in love, the year she discovers the secrets of her family’s past and the year she sets herself free.

Storm boy and his father live alone in a humpy among the sandhills between the Southern Ocean and the Coorong — a lonely, narrow waterway that runs parallel to a long stretch of the South Australian coast.

Among the teeming birdlife of the Coorong, Storm Boy finds an injured young pelican whose life he saves.

From then on, Storm boy and Mr Percival the pelican become inseparable friends and spend their days exploring the wave-beaten shore and the drifting sandhills.

Mr Percival learns to help Storm Boy’s father with his fishing and warn the other birdlife whenever poachers are coming, but his part in rescuing a shipwrecked crew leads to great changes in Storm Boy’s life.

A hundred years ago, Genevieve and Oliver spent an amazing weekend together in Riverswood Manor. They wished they could stay there forever… and then their wish come true.

Blessed with immortality but trapped for eternity, the two former lovers are now thoroughly tired of one another’s company. Then, one dark and stormy night, a stranger called Ella arrives with a cheery disposition and a secret that could be the key to their salvation. With the help of Ella and the return of their best friend, Fionn, Genevieve and Oliver learn more about Riverswood’s tangled history.

If they can come to terms with their own feelings, and the truth that has kept them locked away, they might stand a chance at breaking this curse. True love certainly hasn’t worked.