Child prisoner Joel Brady is facing trial for murder. If he can survive that long...

In the juvenile wing of a prison in Western Australia, fourteen-year-old Joel Brady – small, girly-voiced, nicknamed ‘Psycho’ – is awaiting trial for his role as sidekick to child abductor Marcus Welby.

Joel still isn’t sure what he did that last day at Welby’s outback house of horror; his memory has blotted it out. Is his mind playing tricks in other respects too? Did he really see the malevolent Quentin, another of Welby’s associates, in the adult wing of the prison? Or is Quentin a figment of his imagination, as Joel’s lawyers insist?

A more immediate priority is hiding from the rampaging cons who have escaped the adult wing, one of whom wants Joel’s head. Will his cellmate Glenn, an arch-enemy who has become his first real friend, stay loyal?

Set in an ultra-violent, alpha-male world where human connection is a double-edged sword, and interwoven with a gripping courtroom drama in which the truth about Welby’s chilling set-up gradually emerges, this powerful literary thriller marks the debut of a remarkable talent.