Shark Caller is a stunner of a story – rich with the sights and sounds of its Papua New Guinean setting while also reflecting sagely on universal themes of life and death, family, friendship and time. It’s beautifully written, wise, enticing – haunting at times – but also full of thrills and surprises. An excellent story to challenge readers in Year 6.

Inspired by the author’s own upbringing in the islands of Papua New Guinea, The Shark Caller tells the story of Blue Wing and her guardian Siringen. As the village’s shark caller, Siringen practices an ancient spiritual tradition of taming sharks out on the ocean in his canoe. It’s a dying tradition and is set at sharp odds with the waves of Westernisation sweeping over the island. Blue Wing wants more than anything to become a Shark Caller too but her reasons are more personal as she wishes to avenge the death of her parents – but tradition does not permit a girl like her to follow the same path as her guardian.

When a visiting professor and his daughter Maple arrive from the US, Siringen and Blue Wing are charged with their care. The professor and his daughter embody the Westernisation that the older generations of islanders fear. The girls’ differences cause immediate obstacles to their relationship and each is quick to dislike the other. Over time, however, they discover they have more in common than they thought and a new friendship develops and each discovers things about themselves that they had never realised before. As Blue Wing finds out more about the professor’s real intentions for his time on the island, she realises that she’s not the only one with a deep longing for something, and begins to see ways that they might help each other to find the treasure they seek.

The author’s love of her native island’s landscape shows through beautifully in the writing and the setting has a real sense of authenticity and depth. Blue Wing’s character development unfolds joyfully too, as she works through her grudges and prejudices and learns to embrace both past and future. In short, this is outstanding storytelling that is at once moving, heart-stirring and life-affirming.