'A fragmented hilarious crude mystical soap opera. In a rich Australian idiom Winton lets his characters rip against an evocation of Perth so intense you can smell it' Sunday Telegraph Cloudstreet -- a broken-down house of former glories on the wrong side of the tracks a place teeming with memories of its own a place of shudders & shadows & spirits. From separate catastrophes two families flee to the city & find themselves sharing this great sighing structure & beginning their lives again from scratch. Together they roister & rankle in a house that begins as a roof over their heads & becomes a home for their hearts. In this fresh funny novel full of wonder & dreams Tim Winton weaves the threads of lifetimes of twenty years of shouting & fighting laughing & grafting into a story about acceptance & belonging. ' Imagine Neighbours being taken over by the writing team of John Steinbeck & Gabriel Garcia Marquez & you'll be close to the heart of Winton's impressive tale' Time Out