This collection of short stories by Robert Drewe is set mainly in coastal Australia. The stories are interlinked and follow the lives of various members of the Lang family and capture both the light and darkness of the sea and the bush, places where appearances often belie what is happening beneath the surface. Drewe's prose … Continue reading One Minute Book review – The Bodysurfers by Robert Drewe
One Minute Book Review – Soul Catcher by Michael White
Set in the period just prior to the Civil War, Soul Catcher follows the dangerous journey of professional slave hunter, or soul catcher, Augustus Cain to bring back two runaway slaves of wealthy plantation owner Eberly to whom Cain has gambling debts. The prose is descriptive and evocative with its greatest strength in characterization. Cain … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Soul Catcher by Michael White
My Reading – August 2016
Toby's Room by Pat Barker Noonday by Pat Barker The Cursed Child by JK Rowling, John Tiffany & Jack Thorne The Library of Unrequited Love By Sophie Divry 1914 Poetry Remembers edited by Carol Ann Duffy
One Minute Book Review – Come in Spinner by Dymphna Cusack and Florence James
Originally published in 1951, Come in Spinner follows the lives of a group of women in Sydney over a period of eight days during the latter part of World War 2. Sydney is brought vividly to life - the ever present soldiers both local and American. The women's lives and both the pressures and excitement … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Come in Spinner by Dymphna Cusack and Florence James
One Minute Book Review – Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett
This, the 40th Discworld novel, chronicles the arrival of the locomotive in the Discworld. As would be expected, it is full of Terry Pratchett's usual humour and insight into the human condition. Totally entertaining, it touches lightly on themes such as industrialization, fundamentalism and even gender without even a hint of preachyness. Old characters are … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett
One Minute Book Review – Christ Recrucified by Nikos Kazantzakis
Set in Anatolia in the 1920s under Turkish rule, Christ Recrucified tells the story of Manolios, a shepherd, chosen to play the part of Christ in the village's Passion Play. With the arrival of a group of refugees whose village has been destroyed by the Turks, the lives of those chosen to take part in … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Christ Recrucified by Nikos Kazantzakis
Van Diemen’s Land
Like so many traditional songs there are a number of versions of Van Diemen's Land. Apart from various musical interpretations, there are a variety of lyrics depending on the country of origin of the singer, England or Ireland. The earliest published lyrics can be found in the Launceston Examiner of 21 Nov 1839 (p.2, c1). … Continue reading Van Diemen’s Land
Maps
Quite some years ago I applied for a job cataloguing maps. The interview was going well when one of the interviewers placed a map in front of me and asked me how I would catalogue it - it was a cadastral map overlaying a topographic map of an area of Melbourne in the 1880s. I … Continue reading Maps
9 August 1588 – Elizabeth I’s Speech to her Troops at Tilbury
Armada Portrait On 9 August 1588, Elizabeth I delivered a speech at Tilbury, Essex to troops drawn from all over England in expectation of an immanent Spanish invasion. Elizabeth appeared before the troops dressed in white wearing a silver cuirass and riding on a grey gelding. Other descriptions have her wearing a plumed helmet and … Continue reading 9 August 1588 – Elizabeth I’s Speech to her Troops at Tilbury
One Minute Book Review – Noonday by Pat Barker
The third book in Pat Barker's Life Class trilogy takes up the story of Elinor Brooke, Paul Tarrant and Kit Neville in 1940, over twenty years after the events of the first two books ( 1 -Life Class and 2-Toby's Room) The world is at war again and London is suffering sustained aerial bombing. As … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Noonday by Pat Barker
