This work of fiction is based on recorded events; William Dawes was a lieutenant on the ships which brought the first convicts to Australia. He was a scientist, knowledgeable about astronomy, mathematics and languages who left a record of the language of the indigenous people of the Sydney area. The point of land just to the west of the Harbor Bridge is named Dawes Point and it is...
Muriel Spark is the author of an audiobook I thoroughly enjoyed for its light touch and great humor, called Memento Mori, as well as her best known book, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. The latter is heavy on the message (as I remember from the film) and is a great contrast to Memento Mori. This one is in the middle of these two. In the midst of loving memories of the...
Audiobook. This is one of those books that you are sad to have finished. The story is told by Bruce Pike, looking back on his adolescence in a small town in Western Australia. He is befriended by a daredevil kid called Loonie (an accurate name) who introduces him to the thrill of danger. They take up surfing, and eventually are taken under the wing of an older surfer...
The narrator of Remembering the Bones is a Canadian who was born the same day as the Queen. On her 80th birthday she, along with 98 others have been invited to celebrate with the Queen and as she begins her journey, her car crashes into a ravine near her house and in her helpless state, she realizes only the Queen will realize she is missing. She keeps herself going by reflecting on...
Audiobook. This is a collection of essays about places visited or extraordinary activities. For example, she writes about Midland, Texas during Bush’s campaign for the 2000 election. (Someone pronounced George W a fine fellow who never made a dime.) And she explores the world of the animal horder, specifically a woman who had countless tigers in New Jersey. After a battle that took...
This long saga gives you glimpses into some amazing worlds; most interestingly, twentieth century Addis Ababa. The food, climate, and politics are a backdrop or sometimes a key part of this story which begins with the death in childbirth of a nun that no one knew was pregnant. Even the father of the twins was surprised and he flees the scene, leaving the mission in Addis Ababa...
Audiobook. Last book in the Oz trip preparation series. Cloudstreet is set in Perth, the most isolated city in the world, near the end of WWII. Two families in economic straits move into a huge ramshackle house on Cloud Street. The Pickles family has gambling and drinking problems; the Lamb family is all about hard work. Their 20 years of soap opera dramas, separately and together, are winningly...
The Lieutenant by Kate Grenville. Reviewed in the nyt 9/27. Fiction based on the life of a British marine who was in the First Fleet and tells of his connection to the Aboriginal culture, checked out (10/23) at UVa library. The Dairies of Jane Somers by Doris Lessing, recommended by blogger Patience Crabstick. The Spare Room by Helen Garner, recommended by Reading Matters, set in...
Audiobook. This book, and the narrator Michael Page, were recommended by my friend Jim. It was a great suggestion; this gave me many hours of happy walking and painting. Of course you have to love the dear Pip and the good hearted Joe, but what fun are all the characters. Uncle Pumblechook. Mr. Wopsle who moves to London and becomes an unsuccessful, but...
Another book chosen for its revelations of Australia. The Songlines, published in the US in 1987, is a fictionalized account of a journey in the area northeast of Alice Springs with ruminations on the nomadic life. Chatwin is taken with the idea of wandering as a spiritual path and touches on various nomadic people he has encountered all over the world, as well as references to the nomadic life...