Maura Pierlot
The Lies We Tell Ourselves
Big Ideas Press, 2025
A timely, smart, and utterly compelling story of how to piece yourself together when your world is falling apart.
When gorgeous new student Carter struts into Year 10, Harley knows it's time to reinvent herself. Before long, she's shedding not only weight but her friends, her family, and the person she used to be.
Spiraling deeper into a world where nothing is as it seems, Harley is desperate to find her way back. But first, she must figure out why her dead grandmother is messaging her. Why her father is never home. Why the voice keeps making her do things she doesn't want to do. Why everyone she loves is out of reach. Why everything she wishes for is vanishing before her eyes--or is she the one disappearing?
“Gritty, authentic and unputdownable.”
Fragments: Journeys from Isolation to Connection
Big Ideas Press, 2021
I feel like I'm a piece, a fragment that's missing all the good bits, but I don't know where to find the rest ... the parts I need to work properly. I bet they wouldn't fit anyway. (Lexy, age 17)
Eight young people navigating high school and beyond, each struggling to hold on - to family, to friends, to a piece of themselves. Perhaps you know them. The bubbly girl who keeps telling you she's okay. The high achiever who's suddenly so intense. The young teen obsessed with social media. The boy challenged by communication. Every single day they, and others, are working hard to keep it together. So hard, they don't see their friends are struggling, too. Through eight imagined stories, Fragments moves from a place of disconnection to connectedness.
The action of Fragments takes place in the minds and hearts of an ordinary group of young people. Their stories encompass anxiety, depression, neurodivergence, gender dysphoria, social media, bullying, family dysfunction, cross-cultural diversity and more, culminating in a sense of hope. Although set in Australia, their stories could take place anywhere.
Ages 13+
“‘Fragments’ by Canberra-based playwright, Maura Pierlot, is a powerful set of stories about young people struggling with emotional, social, physical and mental issues during their teenage years. Eight inter-connected monologues give us a deep insight into the personal lives of these people. It’s disturbing, revealing and ultimately quite moving.”
About the Author
Maura Pierlot is an international award-winning children’s book author, playwright and filmmaker who creates on Ngunnawal / Ngambri country (Canberra). Her writing explores existential themes, prompting vital conversations about identity, mental wellbeing and the complexities of the human experience.
