Australian Women Writers Challenge 2013/2014

The end of the year is such a busy time I never got to doing a wrap up post for the 2013 Australian Women Writers Challenge- or to sign up for 2014!

So, let's get caught up.

I blogged 15 books by Australian Women Writers in 2013. Rather incredibly, or perhaps somewhat predictably, 3 of those 15 were by Jackie French. But then I am a little bit obsessed by her.

The Tommorrow Book

Ruby Red Shoes Goes to Paris

Lyrebird!

The Silver Brumby

Tanglewood

Thursday's Child

Picnic at Hanging Rock

Pearlie in Paris

Memoirs of a Suburban Girl

A Day to Remember

Hitler's Daughter

Have you seen Ally Queen?

Peeling the Onion

My Home Broome

Come Down, Cat!

It's interesting to look back at my year of reading Australian Women Writers. 

8 picture books. 

2 Paris books. 

2-4 nonfiction, depending on how you classify them. 

Hmmm, it seems I didn't manage to read any adult books last year! I'll have to change that this year. Although Picnic at Hanging Rock probably counts. 

I wonder how many I'll read in 2014? Hopefully at least 16. Allons-y!

The Tomorrow Book

I read The Tomorrow Book to celebrate last months big, big news that Jackie French will be Australia's next Children's Laureate. Actually I'd already borrowed it from the library before I news came through, as it's always tempting when I see a new Jackie French book on the shelf. Her output is truly vast, and I'd not seen this one before, but even I can manage to sneak in reading another new picture book.

The Tomorrow Book is fantastic! A wonderful book full of hope, passion and zest for life- just like Jackie French.

A little prince loves books. Being a prince he has lots of books, and is a big reader.

But our little prince is an optimist.

He helps out the other kids with their problems, in cool, imaginative, environmentally friendly ways.

There is a strong environmental theme to The Tomorrow Book, but it manages to be fun without being preachy. Jackie French wrote a fabulous Author's Note at the end of the book. It's inspiring.

Our streets, schools and parks could be filled with fruit for anyone to pick, and also be used for markets where neighbours could swap produce and things they no longer need. Our tall buildings could have wildlife sanctuaries on their rooftops, and birds nesting in the vines growing on their walls. Every house could 'condense' moisture from the air to be used to cool or warm the house, as well as for chooks and veggies in the backyard. 

Sue Degennaro's Illustrators Note is fascinating too. I wish picture books always included a note about how the illustrations were made, or their inspiration.

The illustrations in this book were all created from recycled materials. I limited myself to paper found only within the confines of my house. Each image is made up of a collection of packaging found in my kitchen cupboards, such as tea bags, flour packets and match-boxes. I've also used traces of envelopes from mail delivered to my house. Other pieces of paper I collected years ago and have held onto, along with stray cards from a playing deck. 

AWWC 2013

Ruby Red Shoes Goes to Paris

I bought Ruby Red Shoes Goes to Paris a few weeks ago. I saw it on the new shelf in my local bookstore and was helpless to resist its charms. I'd put it on the shelf at home and then promptly forgot about it. Until this week when my friend Brona read it and reminded me. I was particularly sad this particular evening, after some unexpected bad news and thought that Ruby Red Shoes Going to Paris would be a perfect salve. It was.

I'd never heard of Ruby Red Shoes before (turns out this is her second book) but was delighted that she was going to Paris, and of course wanted to read about it. I'm quite happy to read about anyone going to Paris, no matter if it's a cartoon hare and her grandmother or not. Somewhat bizarrely I've even been known to be jealous of a 4 metre chicken going to Paris.

Ruby Red Shoes Goes to Paris a simple, charming story. Ruby Red Shoes is actually a white hare, who naturally is never seen without her red shoes, who lives with her grandmother, Babushka Galina Galushka in a brightly painted old fashioned gypsy caravan. One day Ruby and her grandmother leave their chickens, who are understandably quite miffed at being left at home, and fly to Paris.

Ruby and her grandmother take an apartment, and set themselves up in the city of light. Naturally, the visit many of Paris's most famous sights- The Eiffel Tower, The Rodin Museum, and Cafe de Flore.  All must see sights to be sure. The illustrations are wonderfully detailed and particularly gorgeous.

Musee Rodin is one of my favourite places in Paris too

Who doesn't love Le Tour Eiffel?

Kate Knapp is an Australian author and illustrator/artist who hangs out at Twigseeds in Brisbane. Ruby Red Shoes Goes to Paris took her 8 months of illustrating, 7 days per week!

Dreaming of France is a wonderful Monday meme
from Paulita at An Accidental Blog

Books on France, a great 2013 challenge
 from Emma at Words and Peace

Lyrebird! A True Story

Having a rather keen interest in birds I was obviously intrigued by this title when I saw it on the CBCA  Shortlist for Eve Pownall Book of the Year 2013. It took me a while to get hold of it. The winners have already been announced, and Lyrebird! was an Honour Book this year.

Lyrebird! tells the extraordinary tale of a surprising friendship between a male lyrebird and a widow named Edith Wilkinson. Edith lived in the Dandenongs, east of Melbourne in the 1930s, and made her living growing flowers. One day a male lyrebird visited her and put on quite a show on her verandah. She called him James, and he was to become a frequent visitor.

Lyrebird! had it's origins when Jackie Kerin's partner borrowed a 1933 book called Lore of the Lyrebird, written by the marvellously titled Ambrose Goddard Hesketh Pratt, solicitor, journalist and President of the Royal Zoological and Acclimatization Society. James became quite famous in his day, and was one of the first lyrebirds ever to be filmed and recorded. Jackie became more and more excited by the story. You can hear Jackie talking about Lyrebird! on Radio National here. The book was published by Museum Victoria. It's beautifully illustrated by Peter Gouldthorpe.

Lyrebird! has also been made into a beautiful short movie. For some reason I can't embed it, but I can link to it here. Somewhat intriguingly the film version has a lovely rhyming verse form that the book doesn't have. I'm not sure why. It would have made it a great read aloud book for little kids. The book format is more of an informative type for older children. Peter Gouldthorpe has wisely hidden lots of other birds throughout his illustrations to add interest- kids so love searching for hidden things in books.

The Silver Brumby

I'm so glad to have finally read this classic Australian book, it's a crying shame that I hadn't read it before. I really wish I had read it when I was going through my horse mad preadolescence though, I'm sure it would have become a cherished childhood memory. Reading it now, it's still an enjoyable, rather thrilling story, and I can definitely see why it is such a beloved favourite for many people, especially those lucky enough to read it in their own childhoods. 

The Silver Brumby tells the story of Thowra, a magnificent silver foal born to Bel Bel at the start of the book. Bel Bel teaches Thowra how to survive the difficult life of a brumby (a feral horse in Australia). She teaches him to watch the weather, to learn his way around the rugged terrain where they live, how to find food despite the winter snows, and most of all to be afraid of men. Very afraid. Bel Bel knows that Thowra's beauty will make him become hunted, and that he must use his cunning to remain free. 

Elyne Mitchell's famous Silver Brumby books are set in the remote alpine high country of New South Wales. Elyne lived, worked and rode in the area, and her knowledge and passion for it is very obvious. 

Spring was coming to all this mountain kingdom. Foals would be born, young kangaroos, possums and wombats would be snugly in their mothers' pouches. The hawks and great wedge-tail eagles would hatch their young; fat dingo pups would roll in the sunshine; and the wild horses would fight for their mares and gallop over the hills in all the glory of their strength.

I was surprised to have Bel Bel come across a dingo, as I don't normally think of them as alpine creatures, but they're there in low numbers. I also learnt that the beautiful crimson rosellas that I see every day are also called lowries, I've certainly never heard that name before. I wonder if it was a more common name for them in the 1950s when The Silver Brumby was written?

I do love that she's grounded it in such a specific, real area. Usually I don't like books with maps at the start, but I've enjoyed the map here, and have checked back to it quite often. I have visited the area, but not for a very long time. I've climbed Kosciosko (our highest mountain, and "climbed" I mean walk up the quite gentle track) as a teenager, but haven't really been back since then. I really must take the time to return some time soon. 

The Silver Brumby is well written and fast paced, with action in every shortish chapter. The author really conveys Thowra's fear of man, and his changing nature- his early antics as a foal, his love and knowledge of the wild, high places that Bel Bel has taught him, and his growing maturity as he grows up to become a colt and then a stallion with his own herd.

The bush was quiet as he went on his scouting expedition. The only sounds were the normal rustlings and movements of evening, as the wombats came out to sun themselves in the last pleasant rays, as the animals who feed by day went off to their homes, and those that fed by night started to stir. He knew no possums would come till that strange moment that belongs to no time at all, when it is neither dark nor light. Then their pointed faces, that are both curious and wistful, would peer down on him from the gum trees, and he would smell the strange possum smell, more pungent than eucalyptus, but very like it. 

Elyne Mitchell went on to write 13 Silver Brumby books over 6 decades! The Silver Brumby was Highly Commended in the 1959 Children's Book Council of Australia Awards. Sadly it was beaten by two joint winners- Nan Chauncy's Devil's Hill and John Gunn's Sea Menace, both of which I fear are rather forgotten titles, I've not heard of them before, they appear to both be out of print and neither are available in my library. I've seen it speculated that the horses talking to each other, and to the other animals put the judges off. Whatever it was, with hindsight it was probably a mistake.

The Centenary Edition is perhaps a bit misleading. The centenary is celebrating the anniversary of the birth of the extraordinary Elyne Mitchell, not the publication of the book. Whatever the occasion I do think that it's wonderful that people are still reading this book.

219/1001

Tanglewood

Tanglewood is the most recent book from the rather extraordinary Margaret Wild. I've featured her previously with her last book, The Dream of the Thylacine. I wasn't as familiar with Vivienne Goodman at first glance, but I see now that she illustrated Mem Fox's Guess What?

Tanglewood is a tree, living a rather lonely life "on a tiny island, in the middle of nowhere". Tanglewood is looking for company, and tries to entice seals, dolphins and birds to visit the island. 

But nobody ever came. 

Until a seagull is blown off course in a storm and lands on the island with Tanglewood, and Tanglewood learns about friendship, family and hope. 

Vivienne Goodman has done a beautiful job illustrating Tanglewood's loneliness. 

Tanglewood is doing quite well this year. It was shortlisted for the Picture Book of the Year 2013 by the Children's Book Council of Australia, along with Sophie Scott Goes South, A Day to Remember and The Coat (which took out the award). Tanglewood won the Environment Award for Children's Literature 2013.

Thursday's Child

For some reason I was vaguely apprehensive approaching Thursday's Child. I'm not sure why. I know and respect Sonya Hartnett, and I've even seen a stage production of Thursday's Child a few years ago- it was an extraordinary piece of theatre, very moving. Perhaps it was the cover, which I don't think I like? I don't know. 

Any concerns I had were swept away in the first few pages as I was immersed in the world of the Flute family, primarily through the eyes of Harper Flute, who is 4 when we meet her. Her family eek out a marginal existence in rural Western Australia in the 1920s. Harper's father is a returned soldier and now supporting the family by trapping rabbits and selling the pelts. Da has been injured physically and mentally by the war, and now he drinks a bit more than he should, and we see the start of the Depression unfold through Harper's eyes. We see the day to day struggle to survive through very realistic words. 

This time, however, she hauled me to my feet and, with her free hand, slammed Da over the head. 'Don't you take your miseries out on a child,' she snarled. 'You're a coward,  you are, taking on like an infant. Do you think you're the only one living this life? You aren't. The children and I didn't ask for this. Get to your feet, you disgust me.'

We also see the subterranean world of Tin, Harper's younger brother, and the Thursday's Child of the title (Thursday's child has far to go), who takes to digging tunnels under the family house (always described as a shanty), spending more and more of his life underground. An impossible, improbable story that would be ridiculous in the hands of a lesser writer,  but Sonya Hartnett draws us effortlessly into the rather bizarre home life of the Flute family. Each time I picked up this book I found it compelling all over again, and was immediately drawn back into the Flute world.

Yet Tin's story isn't real. It can't be real, can it? But in Hartnett's hands I can easily suspend disbelief and not be worried by that too much. I generally don't like stories with magic realism elements, and I'm not sure it's that either. Thursday's Child somehow defies classification for me. I've read a few Sonya Hartnett books before, she has written for children and adults, and they often don't seem to be easily classified reads- it's almost like she creates her own genre, and that changes slightly with each new book. It's not all grim and depressing though, there are moments of great humour. 

I talked to him to keep him distracted, ....... and what would the baby be, a new boy or a new girl? We had two of each already, not counting Mam and Da, so things were pretty equal as they stood and it would be a hard blow to the side that came away the minority. I thought it was a shame that only babies could be born,whichever it turned out being. I could think of plenty of other things I would have preferred to get for nothing. 

Thursday's Child is such a powerful, moving story. Beautiful writing stopped me in my tracks on many, many pages. 

My heart is calm now, although it is an uneasy, fitful calm, like the sleep of an ailing person.

I should start a list of books that I mean to reread, and I should put Thursday's Child on that list. 

Picnic at Hanging Rock

I wasn't really sure whether I had read this book before or not. It's such a very famous story in Australia of course, and there was that movie in the 70s so that I do have some memory of people wandering in the bush calling "Miranda, Miranda", but wasn't sure whether that notion had come from seeing the movie or reading the book. I do feel reasonably sure now that I hadn't read this rather sensational book before.

A group of girls at a boarding school in rural Victoria go for a picnic to Hanging Rock on Valentine's Day 1900, some never to return. Joan Lindsay toys with us from the very outset:

Whether Picnic at Hanging Rock is fact or fiction, my readers must decide for themselves.

Most of the book is actually the time after the picnic, after the disappearances. The rumours, the speculation, the gossip, the fallout from a single day. All written in a wonderful way, a beautiful Edwardian language, with a tremendous sense of humour and fun.

The boarders at Mrs Appleyard's College for Young Ladies had been up and scanning the bright unclouded sky since six o'clock and were now fluttering about in their holiday muslins like a flock of excited butterflies. 

A pasty-faced fourteen-year-old with the contours of an overstuffed bolster was standing a few feet away, staring up at the window of a room on the first floor.

I can certainly see why Picnic at Hanging Rock made it into the top 10 Aussie Books You Should Read Before You Die. It's a stonking good read. It's historical fiction, it's a mystery, it's a character study, it's incredibly descriptive. Often lyrical.

And there was God Himself in a red and blue glass window- a terrifying old man rather like his grandfather, the Earl of Haddingham, sitting on a cloud and interfering with everyone down below. Punishing the wicked, caring for the sparrows fallen from their nests in the park, keeping an eye on the Royal Family in their various palaces, saving- or allowing to be shipwrecked according to whim- 'Those In Peril On The Sea'... Finding and Saving, or allowing to perish, the lost schoolgirls on the Hanging Rock.

I will look forward to rereading this one. And watching the movie for the first time this century. I wonder why it isn't on tv terribly often? But first I'm going to search out the mysterious Chapter 18, the unpublished final chapter and read that too.

211/1001

Pearlie in Paris

I'll read pretty much anything set in or about Paris. I do particularly like kids books set in Paris though. I've read a few now. Mr Chicken Goes to Paris. Oops. I get a thrill seeing Paris even in picture book format, and get that familiar buzz, of "ooh, I've been there." So, Pearlie in Paris leapt into my hands recently. 

Wendy Harmer, started off as a journalist, to become one of Australia's most popular comedians back in the late 80s. She then had a career in radio. After her children were born she turned her very clever mind to writing. She has written for adults, young adults and children. The popular Pearlie series of books kicked off with Pearlie in the Park.  I read Pearlie in the Park a few years ago to quell my curiosity. There are now quite a few titles, all very pink and sparkly and designed to appeal to young girls. Pearlie in Paris doesn't disappoint.

Pearlie travels to Paris in spring to visit her friend Fifi, the most famous fairy in Paris, who lives in the Jardin du Palais Royal.

Fifi has been hard at work on her Spring Collection for Fairy Fashion Week. But sequin eating snails cause havoc. Pearlie comes to the rescue with some particularly Aussie solutions. 

Colonnes de Buren

Everyone loves them

Any kids book that uses Zut Alors and Hurly-Burly must get a thumbs up from me. 

Memoirs of a Suburban Girl

Memoirs of a Suburban Girl isn't my typical reading fare. But I'd long remembered the amazing review from Lisa at ANZ Litlovers a little while ago. Can it really have been back in 2011? Eeep. And I'd harboured a lingering desire to read it. 

Recently I was at my library stocking up on a completely unrealistic number of books to take on a short week away- my travel reading eyes are always so much bigger than my reading stomach. But I was determined to read it before it was due back and it's such a slim little volume (a mere 158 pages) I figured I could knock it over in a few days. That turned out to be quite wrong. It actually took me a few weeks. It's a dense read despite the brevity, and I struggled a bit with the somewhat jarring use of second person plural, but I'm really glad to have finally read it. 

Memoirs of a Suburban Girl is a novel not a memoir, still it's a harrowing read. Our unnamed Suburban Girl is a 17 year old living in suburban Adelaide in 1979 when she meets Spunky Boy, SB. The relationship quickly turns violent and nasty, and yet she is enmeshed, trapped with her now Shitty Boyfriend. 

The language and soundtrack is like a flashback to my own teenage experiences. 

1979
The week before you meet him, you race into the disco full of excitement, 'Born to be Alive' pumping out on the dance floor, darkness punctuated by strobe lighting and punters packed in like sardines. 

Thankfully that's where any similarities end though. Suburban Girl is all too soon living with SB, working to support him, cooking his meals, and being beaten and abused by him in a myriad number of ways on a daily basis. She soon works out that he is a pathological liar and his past and present is a tangled web of lies.

So you battle on. You are not stronger than him physically but inside you have all sorts of plans and thoughts and ways to kill him off. You feel like damaged goods- a dented can of corn at the supermarket, a bag with a ripped corner and the rice is starting to spill out. You keep a big brick wall around a special part of yourself and none gets access to it, and that damaged part of yourself that lies behind the wall, is your secret, your shame, your craziness, and your strength to keep going.

All the time while reading I was hoping that this was indeed a true work of fiction, but it does ring awfully true. Turns out it is indeed based on Deb Kandelaars' life experiences, Wakefield Press released it in 2011 to coincide with White Ribbon Day, a campaign to end violence against women. Memoirs of a Suburban Girl is much more than an issue based story though, it's a great read for its own sake.