Free Passage

What price does war exact for freedom? This is war through the eyes of survivors amidst bloodied fields of victims. Set during the Civil War, "Free Passage" tells interlinked stories of men, young women & children, whose lives are torn apart by War. Each of them flies in the face of adversity & each triumphs, though in a very different way. It begins with the tragedy of the Maguire twins & introduces Girl, a deaf slave, who finds forbidden love with a good man, her owner's son, only to have War wrench them apart. She flees to seek freedom for herself & her child in Canada. Migrant tinker, Herr Schmidt, seeks across the war torn States to find his missing daughter, Mina, finding instead a runaway slave & an orphaned boy caring for his little brother. The War makes a man of the boy before his time. Mina escapes her captors & lives by her wits, finding her way to safety & a future she could once only dream. EXCERPT, "Girl's Story," in Wordgathering, Australia, Dec 2014 and in  no.71, 2015 Kaleidoscope, USA

J.R.Poulter [also writing as J.R.McRae] has worked as a senior educator, librarian, lecturer in English Expression, editor and in a circus. A multi-awarded author/poet with over 50 books to her name, she also writes poetry, YA and general readership fiction under J.R.McRae. 
COMMENDATIONS:
Outstanding author - Helen Chamberlin, Hachette, Macmillan, Windy Hollow
Highly original, highly visual author - Mark McLeod, Random House, Hodder
Australia's Scheherazade - Dr. Florence Lewis, Professor of English literature, Berkley, UC
Major Awards: 

• Children's Choice, New Zealand
• in Top Ten Children's Books & YA Books, New Zealand,
• "Mending Lucille" won Crichton, CBCA Award
• Premier's Recommended Reading List, NSW, Australia
• Poetry - Premier's Open Literature Award [Warana]
• Simone Wood  Award, USA - children's book on dance 
• LiFE Award, Literature for Environment [for 3 books]
• Award-Winning Finalist, International Book Awards
• Winner, Purple Dragonfly Award - Picture Books 5 and younger
• "Getting Home" Winner, Purple Dragonfly Award - Best Illustrations
• Readers' Favorite International Book Award Winner

 
Websites:
wordwings.wix.com/publishing