Nathan Hobby’s blog

The Fur is my first novel. After winning the T.A.G. Hungerford Award in 2003, it was published by Fremantle Press in 2004. You can order it from most Australian bookstores or from Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Fur-Nathan-Hobby/dp/1920731016.

It is the story of a reclusive, passionate teenager’s quest to live a meaningful life. The backdrop is a Western Australia from an alternate reality, quarantined from the rest of the world because of the fungus which has infested the state and occupied by UN and Commonwealth troops.  Michael faces the choice of quietism, revolution or escape. Hungry for love, Michael’s dilemma is painfully compounded by his fundamentalist family, his mother’s death and his obsession with beautiful and inaccessible girls. 

‘The Fur is The Catcher in the Rye for the Third Millennium, a darkly passionate attempt to articulate the struggle between the existential and political for all those ‘who wish to be great.’
- Janet Blagg, editor

Nathan Hobby’s imagination is hungry and intense.  He needs a whole world to feed it and then some.’
- Michael McGirr, Sydney Morning Herald
 
‘Polish passion and a brilliant handling of theme mark Nathan Hobby’s debut novel…‘Deals brilliantly with the sort of troubles that beset bright teenagers.  But while it has the same seriousness and insight as Salinger’s novel, it has more breadth… At the very least it should be in every Australian high school library and recommended reading list.’
- Stephen Dedman, The West Australian

To arrange a talk or workshop at your school, shop, church or community group, please contact the author at nathanhobby@gmail.com  .