I read this as a judge for the Aurealis awards, and the rating I gave it there was for how I felt it fit as YA science fiction. The rating here is for how I feel about the book *for me*. It is a powerful and very unpleasant book, although the story had the potential to be so much worse than it was. Possibly if I had gone in to it expecting horror, rather than SF, I might have engaged better -- because there were certainly times where I wondered if it was going down the path of slasher horror, and that only the protagonist would survive.

The story follows Asa, who has moved from a difficult past in the city to live with their alcoholic father in a fictional outback Queensland town. When the Dirt Circus League -- a bunch of apparently hippy kids living in a deserted resort -- turn up and give Asa something to follow, things get grim. Multiple knock-down dragged out bare knuckle fighting scenes, a disturbing doomsday cult, and a whole lot of revisiting traumatic events then follow.

Much darker and more violent than similarly themed books I remember reading as a young adult. ( )