Francesca de Tores is a novelist and poet. She is the author of six novels, published in more than 20 languages. Her first historical novel, Saltblood, was awarded the 2024 Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize. In addition to a collection of poems, her poetry is widely published in journals and anthologies. She grew up in Lutruwita/Tasmania and, after fifteen years in England, is now living in Naarm/Melbourne.

A revelatory meditation on humanity . . . If you’re wondering how any author could wring a novel of more than 300 pages out of such scanty components, the answer is soon clear: compelling characterisation. De Tores’s Selkirk is an adorably reprobate antihero whose company never palls as we follow him through his long days spent hunting and skinning goats, smoking, scavenging and – understandably – engaged in furious bouts of onanism . . . A poignant, sophisticated portrait of a man far more modern and interesting – at least in De Tores’s telling – than the historical record might let on

Francesca de Tores is a novelist and poet. She is the author of six novels, published in more than 20 languages. Her first historical novel, Saltblood, was awarded the 2024 Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize. In addition to a collection of poems, her poetry is widely published in journals and anthologies. She grew up in Lutruwita/Tasmania and, after fifteen years in England, is now living in Naarm/Melbourne.

A revelatory meditation on humanity . . . If you’re wondering how any author could wring a novel of more than 300 pages out of such scanty components, the answer is soon clear: compelling characterisation. De Tores’s Selkirk is an adorably reprobate antihero whose company never palls as we follow him through his long days spent hunting and skinning goats, smoking, scavenging and – understandably – engaged in furious bouts of onanism . . . A poignant, sophisticated portrait of a man far more modern and interesting – at least in De Tores’s telling – than the historical record might let on

Francesca de Tores is a novelist and poet. She is the author of six novels, published in more than 20 languages. Her first historical novel, Saltblood, was awarded the 2024 Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize. In addition to a collection of poems, her poetry is widely published in journals and anthologies. She grew up in Lutruwita/Tasmania and, after fifteen years in England, is now living in Naarm/Melbourne.

A revelatory meditation on humanity . . . If you’re wondering how any author could wring a novel of more than 300 pages out of such scanty components, the answer is soon clear: compelling characterisation. De Tores’s Selkirk is an adorably reprobate antihero whose company never palls as we follow him through his long days spent hunting and skinning goats, smoking, scavenging and – understandably – engaged in furious bouts of onanism . . . A poignant, sophisticated portrait of a man far more modern and interesting – at least in De Tores’s telling – than the historical record might let on