Sandy Bigna
Little Bones
UQP, 2025
Did you know
that if you wish aloud for something
in the stealthy shadows of your bedroom,
if you whisper the words
soft as the brush of a moth’s wing,
if you feel the words rush through your blood,
your wish might come true?
Since the accident, eleven-year-old Bones spends her time drawing animal skeletons and scavenging for dead things to add to her collection. She’s drifted away from her friends and doesn’t want to make new ones.
One night, Bones wishes on a full moon and unintentionally resurrects the skeleton of a baby bird. Bird wants to return to his natural (dead) state, so Bones agrees to reverse the curse – not that she knows how. As she and Bird work out the secrets of the magic, Bones remembers what it’s like to have a friend. How can she let Bird go when she doesn’t want to say goodbye?
Winner, 2025 Queensland Literary Awards – Children's Book Award
Shortlisted, 2025 Speech Pathology Australia Book of the Year Awards – Eight to ten years
With gorgeous greyscale illustrations of Bones’s collected items scattered throughout, this book is perfect for big-hearted readers of Karen Foxlee and Zana Fraillon.
About the Author
Sandy Bigna is a passionate supporter of local children’s literature. She started up the Aussie Kids Books Instagram, which reviews Australian children’s and YA books. She has studied children’s literature at the University of Canberra and worked as a children’s librarian in a public library. She has been awarded two Varuna Residential Fellowships and her YA manuscript Exposed was shortlisted for the HarperCollins Australia Matilda Children’s Literature Prize in 2020. Little Bones is her debut novel.
