Praise is an utterly frank and darkly humorous novel about being young in the Australia of the 1990s. A time when the dole was easier to get than a job, when heroin was better known than ecstasy, and when ambition was the dirtiest of words. A time when, for two hopeless souls, sex and dependence were the only lifelines.

‘McGahan’s book is a bracing slap in the face to conventional platitudes and hypocrisies.’ - The Australian

‘Praise is one of those books that takes a hefty bite out of a piece of subject matter, chews it to a pulp and then spits it out.’ - Peter Craven

‘A tour de force… revelation of life in the slow lane of drugs and sex and alcohol.’ - The Weekend Australian

Winner of The Australian/Vogel Literary Award and the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book in the Pacific Region. Shortlisted for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award, the Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature and the Canada-Australia Literary Award.