Join us at 6.30pm on Monday 8th September at Lourdes Hill College as we welcome Lourdes alumna Toni Jordan as she speaks in conversation with Frances Whiting about her beautiful new novel Tenderfoot. The bestselling, award-winning author of Addition brings us an exhilarating novel about coming of age in 1970s Australia.

About the Book…

Brisbane, 1975: Andie Tanner's world is small but whole. Her mum is complicated, but she adores her dad and the kennel of racing greyhounds that live under their house. Andie is a serious girl with plans: finish school with her friends, then apprentice to her father until she can become a greyhound trainer, with dogs of her very own.

But real life rarely goes to plan, and the world is bigger and more complicated than Andie could imagine. When she loses everything she cares about - her family, her friends, the dogs -it's up to Andie to reclaim her future. She will need all her wits to survive this new reality of secrets and half-truths, addictions and crime.

With luminous, aching prose, Tenderfoot will move you like no other story this year.

About the Author…

Toni Jordan has worked as a molecular biologist, quality control chemist, TAB operator and door-to-door aluminium siding salesperson. She is the author of the international bestseller Addition, which was longlisted for the Miles Franklin Award and has been adapted into a feature film, in cinemas in 2025. Her novel Nine Days was awarded Best Fiction at the 2012 Indie Awards and was named in Kirkus Review's top 10 Historical Novels of 2013; Our Tiny, Useless Hearts, was longlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award; and her two Schnabel family novels, Dinner with the Schnabels and Prettier if She Smiled More, were critically acclaimed. Toni has been published widely in newspapers and magazines. She holds a Bachelor of Science in physiology and a PhD in Creative Arts and lives in Melbourne. Tenderfoot is her eighth novel.