A Place to Stand

Ill never go back she said. Never.Sandra McLeod arrived in New Zealand as a child with her British family. It was 1954. But the familys hopes for a new and better life faltered in the raw timber town and at sixteen Sandra fled. All she took with her were numbness and denial. Fifteen years later a letter arrives and Sandra now a successful real estate agent knows she must go back. Back to her mothers vacant eyes and the secrets of the McLeod family. Back to unpick her past and to learn about loss grief mothering -- and perhaps a chance of finding home. Set in Kawerau a small town on the volcanic plateau this poignant novel explores the cost of migration and what it means to find deep connection with place.