The Keepers
The Keepers is the story of Jay, a mother devoted to the care of her teenage twins. With an absent husband and battling a nightmare bureaucracy, Jay leans heavily on Keep, her lifelong half-real friend. But in the corner of her eye lurks her mother, and a childhood Jay knows she can’t ever outrun.
The Keepers is an incredible and fiercely honest novel about the damage done by parents who can’t love, the failures of a community that only claims to care, and the resilience of those whose stories mostly go untold.
“Only so many lanterns strung to guide our way,
from the beginning of us to the end.
A happy life is one where the distance between each is short, always just enough light to keep the darkness at your heels and not at your throat.”
“The Keepers is an extraordinary piece of writing. A constellation of love and pain opening up to the reader in a magical and terrifying way. It’s utterly remarkable.”
– Annabel Crab
“A biting commentary on inequity … marvellously scathing.”
— Jo Case, The Sydney Morning Herald
“Al Campbell is a mother and full-time carer of two sons with autism. She is also a phenomenal writer. The Keepers is her first novel, and I can honestly say, I have never read anything like it.”
— Tye Cattanach, Readings, Carlton
Al and The Keepers on podcasts
Watch Al chat with Valerie Khoo on So You Want to be a Writer.
Hear Al chat with James McKenzie Watson and Ashley Kalagian Blunt on At Home with James and Ashley.
Hear Annabel Crabb discuss The Keepers on her podcast, Chat 10 Looks 3.