It was strange how staring at things could alter their appearance. Miranda thought it was weird how she could transmute quite ordinary things into images. It was no good. What with Grandma looking after the family, little Jimmy to care for, her sister's baby bellowing in the middle of the night - not to mention Yvette's creep of a boyfriend Dave - it was no wonder Miranda had started to see things. Trouble is, it soon starts to get a bit out of hand, and it's about time they all discovered...

Growing up in Brisbane in the 1970s and 80s, Zoë Boccabella knew if you wanted to fit in, you did not bottle tomatoes, have plastic on the hallway carpet or a glory box of Italian linens. Though she tried to be like ‘everyone else’, refusing to learn Italian and even dyeing her dark hair blonde, Zoë couldn’t shake the unsettling sense of feeling ‘half-and-half’ - half Australian, mezza italiana - unable to fit fully into either culture, or merge the two. Years later, she travels to her fam...