Orbiting, by Laurie Steed

Stories from the Southern Cross consists of three new pieces of writing produced in collaboration with the first Australia New Zealand Literature Festival. Each story represents a new voice from the Antipodes - a place at once very familiar, but in fact quite different.

The series depicts a world of aggressive ennui, of suburban sprawl battling with a voracious bush and extreme weather, of taboos and generations colliding as old, White Australia comes to terms with another generation of migration.

In this third story, Sophie lives in a world of extremes, clinging to friendships and partners in a town battling the encroaching bush and bone-dry weather; in a community prone to frantic enjoyment and sudden violence and at all times vulnerable to the threat of bush fires.

Narrator: Linda Taimre

Producer: David Roper
A Heavy Entertainment production for BBC Radio 4.