‘Malcolm Knox’s The Wonder Lover is a book in love with language and the possibilities of storytelling. I loved it.’ Christos Tsiolkas, The Saturday Age/Spectrum

‘I loved it. Wonderful and sad. Sad and wonderful. He is a brilliant writer.’ Don Watson, ABC Book Club

‘Gradually unfolding the three marriages, with the tone growing more dark and complex, it becomes an exquisitely wrought dissection of one man’s downfall and a reminder that of all the records and extremities Wonder encounters, the most revelatory is the damage human beings inflict on one another.’ Sunday Age

Praise for The Life

‘A vivid and essential piece of work.’ Australian Book Review

‘It confirms what ought to have been more widely recognised, that he [Knox] is one of the most considerable of our novelists in what is at least a silver, if not a golden, age of Australian fiction.’ Peter Pierce, Sydney Morning Herald

‘Malcolm Knox explores the inner life of men with both surgical insight and heartfelt compassion … The Life digs in deep.’ Michael McGirr, The Age

‘Plot is one thing, mere reviewer’s necessity, but voice is another. Here is where the novel seduces and converts … it is clear Knox is on to something here. He has written a vivid and essential piece of work.’ Adam Rivett, Australian Bookseller & Publisher

‘The Life is also just a bloody good read.’ Stephen Romei, The Australian

‘You don’t have to be a surfer or be familiar with the story of Peterson to appreciate Knox’s superb storytelling and his rhythmic, evocative prose in homage to one of Australia’s most intriguing sporting characters.’ Greg Stolz, Sunday Times

‘Knox has never written better than in The Life. Page after page is radiant with the energy.’ Geordie Williamson, Weekend Australian

‘The book is worded in the crackling stream of detritus that flows from Keith’s broken mind—a sort of Catcher in the Rye for Antipodean surfers.’ Inside Sport

‘I envy the confidence and the naturalness of that book—it moves and shrugs, completely itself, like a wave.’ Charlotte Wood, Bookseller & Publisher

‘If Winton is an aria, Knox is early Rolling Stones.’ The Guardian

Malcolm Knox was born in 1966. His award-winning novels and non-fiction titles have been published in Australia and internationally. A journalist with the Sydney Morning Herald since 1994, he has won three Walkley Awards for investigative journalism, magazine feature writing and sports journalism, as well as a Human Rights Commission Award. He lives in Sydney with his family.

DEDICATION

For my family

FIRST PART

BIRD’S EYE

Bird’s eye