State Ward

A moving, powerful novel about facing your crimes, about freedom and about redemption, from the renowned author of Once Were Warriors.

'I'm thirteen and I'm in a cell. A cell. It's got real bars, up there protecting that high window. I can jump up and touch them. I'm in a cell. That door is for real; it's made of solid steel, and it's got a peephole. So they can spy on me. But I ain't gonna bust. I damn well ain't.'

Charlie Wilson, the 'state house boy' from Two Lakes, is sent to Riverton Boys' Home as a state ward 'until such time as you are seen fit to return to society'. The door in the cellblock isn't the only thing that Charlie finds is for real. There's also the name 'George' scrawled on the walls, and by it the word 'kehua' or ghost . . .