Top 20 reads for the holidays including some great local books to explore Margaret River and Augusta

is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.

Over 240 pages, with charts, paintings, drawings and historical and modern photographs, Whale Hunters of the West collects the logbooks, letters and early newspapers from almost 200 years ago to reveal a brutal yet vital trade for early settlers.