SHORT-LISTED: 2022 CBCA Book of the Year, Younger Readers

How to save a dragon:
1)Assemble equipment. Water, Weet-Bix, sugar, syringe, sticky tape, scissors.
2)Believe in everything.

Pip never wants to go home. She likes to sit at the waterhole at dusk and remember Mika, her best friend. At home her mother's not the same since her boyfriend moved in. They don't laugh anymore and Pip has to go to bed early, turn off her light and pretend she doesn't exist. When she finds a half-dead creature at the waterhole, everything changes. She knows she has to save this small dragon and return it to where it comes from. But how?

A story about surviving and saving those you love, by the multi-award-winning author of Lenny's Book of Everything.

'I'm in love with this book. Dragon Skin is surprising, beautiful, unique. The characters are wonderfully drawn - tough but vulnerable, hurt but hopeful, damaged but strong. They've lodged themselves in my heart forever.' Katrina Nannestad, award-winning author of We Are Wolves

'Dragon Skin is a book to make us believe in mysterious openings and infinite possibilities. It reminds us that love is what we need to save things.' Edwina Wyatt, award-winning author of The Secrets of Magnolia Moon 'I loved this story. It's a delicate, heartwarming tale of friendship, healing and hope.' Bren MacDibble, award-winning author of How to Bee 'Dragon Skin explores what it really means to love, to nurture and to let go. This book will make your heart burst with courage and hope.' Leanne Hall, award-winning author of Iris and the Tiger 'Foxlee doesn't flinch at dark themes and handles them with a light touch appropriate for readers aged 10 to 14. The intimations of domestic violence in the book lend contrast and provide a wrenching backdrop, to the joys and consuming demands of Pip's adventure.' The Age 'Karen Foxlee is skilled at writing brave yet vulnerable young characters who steal readers' hearts forever, and Dragon Skin is no different ... a truly unique book and will especially appeal to readers who love adventures that are embedded with contemporary concerns. A magical tale that proves what you most need to survive is love.' Books+Publishing 'Dragon Skin is a beautifully packaged, engrossing and touching, wonder of a book full of heartache and hope.' Canberra Times 'A charming and poignant adventure that intelligently illuminates themes spanning family, friendship, vulnerability, and the beauty of the broken.' Teen Breathe 'An adventurous story with heart and hope,' The South Western Times 'Karen Foxlee really is a genius of a writer - so adept at whimsy, heart and utterly relatable characters. I believe her writing is ageless in the sense that it is accessible to all ages and her stories are so full of meaning ... It is a pretty amazing feat to accomplish that all in a children's novel that can actually be enjoyed by kids. I think she is fast taking first place in my mind for Middle Fiction writers (a position Kate Di Camillo has held for many years)!' Alison Williams, A&U Children's Product Manager 'Karen Foxlee has a gift for writing about courage, love, fear, anxiety and isolation - always with a sense of hope and rays of goodness. The friendships that developed in the story were moving and believable, and a reminder that we often have a very skewed perception of other people. I absolutely loved it.' Liz Christie, A&U SA Account Manager

Biographical note: Karen Foxlee is an Australian author who writes for both kids and young adults. She grew up in the Australian outback mining town of Mount Isa and still frequently dreams she is walking barefoot along the dry Leichhardt River. Ophelia and the Marvellous Boy, Karen's first novel for children, was published internationally to much acclaim while her second novel for younger readers, A Most Magical Girl, won the Readings Children's Fiction Prize in 2017 and was CBCA short-listed the same year. Her next book was the internationally successful Lenny's Book of Everything, which has won multiple awards including the NSW Premier's Literary Award, the Indies Book Award, the Queensland Literary Award, was a CBCA Honour Book and was nominated for the Carnegie Medal. Karen lives in South East Queensland with her daughter and several animals, including two wicked parrots, who frequently eat parts of her laptop when she isn't looking. Her passions are her daughter, writing, day-dreaming, baking, running and swimming in the sea.