In the suburbs of Brisbane, 1975, 12-year-old Andie Tanner lives with her father, her mother and “four quiet souls … downstairs, underneath the house”: her father’s racing greyhounds. Her life is simple and whole, made up of her family, the streets of Morningside, her suburban primary school and the dogs – who Andie adores above all else.
Toni Jordan’s eighth novel, Tenderfoot, opens in a world built around these greyhounds; the kennels, the raised bench used for treatments, the kibble and powders, scales and leads and muzzles and collars. Andie’s parents are gamblers and to them gambling is a “family legacy, an ideology of living”. But they train their dogs meticulously, a way of mastering chance in a game otherwise ruled by it. On the track, the hounds resist the laws of nature; “to them, gravity means nothing. They hover … are streaks of light; they are life, flashing before your eyes.”
