Writer Holden Sheppard is currently enjoying a new crop of fans discovering his work thanks to the hugely popular TV adaptation of his debut novel Invisible Boys.
Later this year his third work King of Dirt will arrive in bookshops, and he’s just shared the cover to the new offering.
The novel will be Sheppard’s third release following Invisible Boys and The Brink. Like Invisible Boys the action takes place in Sheppard’s hometown of Geraldton.
King of Dirt is described as a gritty and heartfelt gay coming-of-age story set in the world of FIFO workers and tradies in Western Australia.
Giacomo Brolo, aka Jack, is a mess. He works piecemeal construction gigs in remote WA, drinks himself to oblivion and is estranged from his family and friends. He’s consumed by a self-loathing all too common for closeted men who have grown up in a world of hate and shame.
But then Jack returns to his regional hometown of Geraldton for a family wedding. He hasn’t been back since he fled at the age of eighteen, and his past soon catches up with him.
Turns out Jack’s deeply conservative Italian family would prefer he remained in the closet. Then he finds out he may have conceived a son with his teenage girlfriend, and now Jack needs to convince her and her new husband that he’s fit to be a father figure. And whatever happened to Xavier, the former schoolmate who Jack was in love with and whose rejection spurred him to leave Geraldton in the first place?
Is Jack doomed to live a dead-end life – or can he open himself up to the possibility of love, found family and connection?
King of Dirt is in stores across Australia and New Zealand on 3 June 2025 and is available for pre-order now.
