Hemispheres

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2011 EAST MIDLANDS BOOK AWARDMoving from the gas-flares of Teesside, to marine adventures in the South Atlantic, Hemispheres is a salutary and searing debut novel for anyone who enjoyed Kes and The Northern Clemency. When sixteen-year-old Danny's father, Yan, leaves their Teesside home to fight in the Falklands War, he never returns and Danny imagines he is either dead or has abandoned him and his mother for good. So when, thirty years later, Yan reappears, there is much to be explained, and forgiven, if father and son are to reconcile their broken relationship. Yan has spent the lost years half a world away, adrift on a remarkable chain of adventures set in motion when he deserted from the army. But when he discovers he is dying from lung cancer, he returns to his homeland in the north-east of England to reconcile his damaged relationship with his son. Separated by years and experience, father and son find unexpected solace and harmony together through their shared love of birds and birdwatching. Hemispheres is a gloriously ambitious debut novel about family, destiny, nature and coming home.