“Childhood,” writes Toni Jordan in her eighth novel, Tenderfoot, “is as much a place as it is a time.” The place? Suburban Brisbane – specifically Morningside – and the city’s greyhound tracks, which throb with punters on race days. The time? Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s febrile 1970s, a memorable era of political regression and palm-greasing by police.
Jordan’s protagonist, the bruised and cerebral Andie, is 12 years old, on the cusp of finishing primary school. She’s a gifted student – precocious but impeccably polite. Despite her natural academic prowess, she has one goal: to drop school at 15 and become a greyhound trainer, just like her beloved father.
