Queen Victoria Building Christmas Tree 2022 Summer has been missing in action for most of December (third year in a row!) but the meteorologists are promising that the next few days should be sunny and 28° C. We can but hope. I'm working right up until the very end this year, so Christmas Day will be … Continue reading Seasons Greetings 2022
image source from the frontispiece of Alone in West Africa Originally published for the Australian Women Writer's Challenge: The Early Years on 14 December 2022. My previous post about Mary Gaunt, ended around 1910 just after the publication of three very popular books co-authored with John Ridgewell Essex. These three successful books about Africa [The Arm … Continue reading Mary Gaunt #AWWbio
To look at Miss Georgina Carter you would never have suspected that a woman of her age and character would have allowed herself to be so wholeheartedly mixed up with an Ifrit. For Georgina Carter was nearing fifty (she was forty-seven to be exact) and there was something about her long, plain face, her long … Continue reading Miss Carter and the Ifrit | Susan Alice Kerby #DeanStreetDecember
"Long-distance call for Bruce," a F.A.N.Y. sergeant, soured by the years of peace between the wars, looked into the commonroom and addressed me in the third person. "It can be taken in the office but must be short. Personal calls are not encouraged during a state of emergency." What a delightful way to spend a … Continue reading Spam Tomorrow | Verily Anderson #DeanStreetDecember
7 December 1962, Devon 7 REASONS NOT TO DIE: 1. Skin. To never again feel the skin of one's beloved child. Not another fictionalised biography I hear you cry! One day I will work out why I am so drawn to this genre. But for now, I give you Sylvia Plath and Euphoria. What do … Continue reading Euphoria | Elin Cullhed #SWEfiction
By midnight all was blaze and disintegration. A group of soldiers standing on the hill watched with indecent pleasure. The wind locals called the Vardaris blasted from the north, puffed minarets into candles and monuments to blocks of gold. A whoosh of flame - shaped paisley in its exotic unfurling - caused some spontaneously, shamelessly, … Continue reading Salonika Burning | Gail Jones #AWWfiction
It’s time for another Classics Club spin. When I went to put this spin together during the week, I realised I had finished my CC List #2. How on earth did I miss that? Pure and simple - slackness! I'd forgotten to update my links for most of this year. The good news is that … Continue reading Classics Club Spin #32
A common theme emerges if you search online for 'menopause cartoons'. There's no shortage of offerings - over 7 million results when I Googled recently - and they overwhelmly depict women looking dumpy, dowdy and elderly....My generation - Gen X - don't consider ourselves old, or dowdy, or past it. I read This Changes Everything: … Continue reading This Changes Everything | Niki Bezzant #NZnonfiction
The other day, a new Classic Club Spin was announced. When I went to check my CC LIST #2 for which books were left, I realised I had been a bit slack about updating it. By the time I added in my recent review of Voss, I was delighted to discover that CC LIST #2 … Continue reading Classics Club List #3
Voss Readalong November 2022 Opening Lines: "There is a man here, miss, asking for your uncle," said Rose. And stood breathing. I love this opening. I can just see Rose, the hard-working, impatient, put-upon servant being asked to do something she doesn't normally have to do on a Sunday, and doing it huffily and with … Continue reading Voss | Patrick White #ReadtheNobels
Tonight’s Socceroo themed Opera House Not my usual post I know, but since 2005 thanks to Mr Books, B25 & B22 football has been a huge part of my life. This past week I’ve had to live with some tired, grumpy but ultimately very happy early morning World Cup viewers. At 6am AEST the Socceroos … Continue reading Living on a dream
Stories & Shout Outs with bronasbooks.com November was a HUGE blogging month, and in the end, I only just managed to keep up with AusReading Month. Non-fiction November fell by the wayside as I could not keep up with all the posting and reading. In attempt to relieve this blogging bottleneck, I am contemplating a … Continue reading Stories & Shout Outs #55
AusReading Month 2022 Thank you one and all for your reviews and comments throughout November. It's a busy blogging month, so I appreciate how creative you are at combining the various book events. To this end, I have been thinking about 2023. When I first started AusReading Month in 2013, I chose November because of … Continue reading AusReading Month | Wrap up + Poll
Accidentally Kelly St illustrated by Briony Stewart with lyrics by Tim O’Connor from Frente! For people of a certain age, or perhaps people who had young children in 1992/93, you will remember the bubbly, joyful, effervescent pop group Frente! bouncing around our screens in colourful clothes, hair rollers and pearls. Accidentally Kelly Street was the … Continue reading A few Australian children’s books to finish off AusReading Month 2022
Burning Questions is my third collection of essays and other occasional pieces. The first Second Words, which began in 1960, when I started publishing book reviews, and ended in 1982. The second was Moving Targets, which gathered materials from 1983 to mid-2004. Burning Questions runs from mid-2004 to mid-2021. So, twenty years, give or take, … Continue reading Burning Questions | Margaret Atwood #CANessays
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