Cate Whittle
Starberries and Kee
Storytorch, 2023
The stars linked them through space – and even through time. Those same stars had looked down on all the people that had come before her and would still twinkle when she was as old as Libby and maybe even if she had great-grandchildren of her own.
Wren is a Wild Child who has been brought up on the mountain by Old Man, learning everything he knows from nature, while Hannah has always lived in the city. When their paths collide, a secret friendship brings a family full circle, linking the past to the present and the old with the new.
Starberries and Kee is solar punk climate-fiction told with positivity and hope. It confirms that in the face of crisis, it is community and compassion that defines us, connecting us to the future we choose to create.
About the Author
Cate Whittle writes fantasy and adventure fiction for children and young adults and has published six books and has three more on the way. She writes about relationships and rediscovery (and dragons and magical worlds), seeking to empower her young readers to become problem-solvers and to see their world in a positive light. Cate also has short stories and articles in anthologies and magazines – one of her favourites being about the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone National Park in the US and how that transformed and re-established the native environment there (Pearson Magazines – Challenge Issue 2, 2009: An Old Enemy).
Fascinated by the natural world, Cate is fortunate to live on a bush block in a beautiful rural valley near the nation’s capital. She loves to walk and take photographs and make art, and, curious about her own backyard, has a passion for encouraging curiosity in others about the world around us and how we can interact more positively with nature, the people we meet, and different cultures and world views for a hopeful future. Cate truly believes that information is the key to understanding, and that the world can only be a better place if we open our eyes and hearts to the diversity around us and learn to live in sync with nature and with one another.
