TW: This conversation touches on themes of abuse, proverty and violence.

Today in the Confessional, host Sandy Lowres chats with the remarkable and down to earth Australian author, Kirsty Jagger.

Kirsty is a journalist by trade. In 2019, she won the inaugural Heyman Mentorship Award, established by acclaimed Australian author Kathryn Heyman for a writer from a background of social or economic disadvantage. Roseghetto takes some inspiration from growing up in the housing commission estates of Sydney’s western suburbs. This is her first novel.

Roseghetto is a stunning debut novel which follows Shayla, a young woman on a newspaper assignment who returns to the public housing estate where she grew up and finds it demolished. The locals have been evicted, their homes erased, their stories too. Standing among the rubble of Rosemeadow, Shayla is assailed by her memories of living there. The bad secret Daddy asked her to keep. Mummy rekindling a dangerous romance. Making friends with ‘the gutter kids’. Surrounded by poverty, confronted by domestic violence, Shayla found her escape in reading. Now it’s time to tell the stories of Rosemeadow, including her own.

Roseghetto is an unforgettable and moving coming-of-age story, an account of breaking the cycle of violence and poverty.

Kirsty shares her hard won wisdom of growing up in similar circumstances to the characters she has created, and finding her own way out to find a better life.

You can follow Kirsty Jagger here:

https://www.uqp.com.au/authors/kirsty-jagger
https://www.instagram.com/kirtsyjagger_author
https://www.facebook.com/kirstyjagger-author

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