The Drover's Dogs
Description
Ten-year-old Sandy's childhood ends when his mother sells him to a farmer who half-starves and beats him.
So he runs away for good, away from the farm and from home.
Alone on the road, penniless, Sandy is lucky to find friends: Spot and Patch, two drover's dogs, who are making their way home all by themselves.
With no idea where they are going, Sandy joins them, following them across Scotland, through a wild landscape of loch and mountain, to the Hebridean island of Mull in the West.
When the dogs lead him to their croft, Sandy's deepest wish seems to have come true. He, too, has found a loving home.
He is happier at Lachlan's croft than he thought he could be, until he discovers that he is not really wanted there at all.
Unwelcome, he takes to the road again. But without his four-legged friends.
Will he go through his whole life friendless and lonely?
Susan Price is an acclaimed writer of books for the young. She has won the Carnegie medal and the Guardian Fiction prize and her books have been translated into many languages.
More details
Person
I was firmly convinced that I decided to become an author at the age of seven, after reading Kipling's Jungle Books - until I was talking to my aunt recently.
She told me that she remembered me marching up to her and my grandmother, putting my hands on my hips and announcing,'When I grow up I'm going to be a writer!'
"You were four,"she said.
Whether four or seven when I made the decision, I never wavered thereafter. I have always been single-minded. But bloody-minded single-mindedness is an essential quality in a writer. Without it, you probably wouldn't even finish a first draft.
My father signed my first publishing contract, because I was 16, and under-age. I'd have been fairly happy if that had been my one and only book. But luck was with me, and I've gone on to publish something like 60 books, for different ages and in different genres; and am now self-publishing on Kindle - something that wasn't even envisaged in science-fiction when my first book came out. Life remains interesting!
Find out more about Susan Price's books at her website: https://www.susanpriceauthor.com/
She is a founder member of the Authors Electric Collective, whose blogs can be found here: http://bit.ly/GD4LUv
