Tag Archive | Australia

Read around the world (reflective)

Jul31

We’ve circled the globe during July and the Ultimate Blog Challenge, highlighting books set in many countries (and eras).

The Grassland Trilogy reaches back beyond written history, showing the courage of young people trying to Escape the Mask, see Beneath the Mask, and go Beyond the Mask.

Cate of the Lost Colony traveled from the glittering court of Queen Elizabeth I to the desolate sand dunes of Roanoke in the New World, and Plain Kate, driven from her home by superstition, must search for answers down the river, into the mists.

Esty’s Gold took us from famine-stricken Ireland to the Australian goldfields in the 1880s, while The Reformed Vampire Support Group sticks together in today’s Sydney.

Online gamers in China, India, Singapore and the US are fighting For the Win and a fair chance at life.

Annexed and Briar Rose brought us perspectives on the Holocaust – the Netherlands, Germany, Poland – so many bitter sorrows, so many untold tales.

Modern-day Paris hides decades-old secrets in Die For Me, while in Montreal, Mira just wants her own today in Pieces of Me.

And we’ve just begun the Rivers of Time trilogy, as Lia and Gabi go back to 14th century Tuscany in Waterfall.

Oh, the photo up there? That’s me aboard the wooden sailing ship Southern Swan in Sydney Harbour in the 21st century. Ready for more great books in August?
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Reformed Vampire Support Group, by Catherine Jinks (fiction) – ethical vampires hunt a killer

Jul30

Sneak-in Saturday and another fun book that sneaked onto the bestseller lists before I could blog it for you.

Ahh, being a vampire must be exciting, right? Nah, can’t do much outdoors if bright light makes your eyes bleed. How to explain to the neighbors that you’re never getting any older? And if you just don’t believe that it’s ethically right to fang another human and turn them into a vampire without their consent?

Welcome to the small, but annoying world of the vampires in Australia, all of whom were changed by one vicious vampire. So for years, they’ve held regular Tuesday night support group meetings so they can stay “reformed” and keep their blood cravings under control. When one member is thoroughly and brutally snuffed out, it’s up to the Reformed Vampire Support Group to find the killer, even if they go into coma-like sleep the moment that the sun peeks over the horizon…

Lock up your guinea pigs when you read this funny take on the vampire mythos.
Followed by The Abused Werewolf Rescue Society.
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Book info: The Reformed Vampire Support Group / Catherine Jinks. Harcourt Children’s Books, 2009 (hardcover) [author’s website] [publisher site] [book trailer] Review copy & cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Recommendation: When a vampire is murdered, the other vampires have to find the killer, right? Especially reformed vampires who fang guinea pigs instead of humans. A stake through the heart and a silver bullet and exposing the vampire to sunlight – that’s overkill, even for the undead. A real vampire-hater has accessed doubly-dead Casimir’s online address book and is coming after the other vampires of Sydney!

After complaining for years in their weekly support group meetings that nothing happens when you’re asleep all day and lock yourself up every full moon, suddenly the group has too much to do. Relying on Father Ramon, the human priest who helps them stay reformed, forever-15 Nina (who writes vampire fiction to pay her mom’s rent) and friends travel in a dark, sealed van to the Outback, following clues from silver bullet sales records and online bulletin boards.

Trapping a vampire-killer, finding a werewolf, getting back to safety before their supply of guinea pigs runs out – who knew that being a vampire would suddenly be so complicated?

This story of the good-hearted undead battling a pack of heartless humans is a wild romp with unexpected twists. Dark glasses? Check. Guinea pig? Check. Barf bag? Ooof. Followed by The Abused Werewolf Rescue Group. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Esty’s Gold, by Mary Arrigan (fiction) – from Irish famine to Australia’s goldfields

Jul27

Famine! How could your family survive?

That’s the life-changing question that 12-year-old Esther faces, as we go back to the Irish Potato Famine of 1845 on this World Wednesday.

As the blight makes potatoes rot when they’re dug up, poor Irish rental farmers and their families starve to death with their main food source gone. While having just one variety of potato planted all over Ireland contributed to the problem, the Famine was largely caused by the laws forbidding Irish Catholics from owning land.

When Esty’s father is killed trying to help starving farmers, she and her mother and granddad no longer have a home, and Esty must hire out as a servant. Emigration out of Ireland is offered – many travel to the United States, but Esty has carefully read the newspapers discarded by her employer and finds a way for her family to get to the goldfields of Australia.

The Mahers will face bandits, harsh weather, backbreaking toil, and outright prejudice as they dig for gold in Ballarat in this exciting story based on history.

If your local independent bookstore doesn’t have Etsy’s Gold, they’ll be glad to order it for you. Check your local library, too!
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Book info: Esty’s Gold / Mary Arrigan. Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, 2010. [author’s website] [publisher site]

Recommendation: Surely the potato blight won’t hurt Esty’s family, her papa being agent for the landowner, right? But the famine in 1840s Ireland cuts deep, and 12-year-old Esty finds herself hired out as a servant, with Mama and Grandpa sent from their big house to a tiny cottage.

As the large landowners continue evicting the tenants who can’t pay rent or feed their families because of the blight, more rebellion springs up. Esty reads the newspapers discarded by her employers and dreams of taking her family away from the famine, off to the goldfields of Australia.

Such a long journey, from Ireland to the other side of the world! And what perils along the way to the goldfields at Ballarat – thieves, wild weather and worse!

Can Esty really find a way to get her family all the way to Australia? Will they be tough enough to survive the pioneer conditions at the edge of the Outback? Can they find gold or will Ballarat be one more heartbreak for the Mahers?(One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Visconti House (fiction)

Jun14

Out of place. The house is out of place in their small Australian town, and Laura is, too.

Since her dad’s writing can be sent from anyplace, the family moved away from the small house in the big city to this huge old house in the small town, so her mum would have more room to create her enormous sculptures.

Of course Laura explores the house’s many rooms, with their fading hand-painted murals and dilapidated velvet curtains and wants to know why… why Mr. Visconti came all the way from Italy to this particular town, why he built this unusual house, why he spent his life here alone, why the cellar door is wallpapered over, why…

This debut novel by an Australian librarian is a charming story of lost loves, found friendships, and a search for understanding.
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Book info: The Visconti House / Elsbeth Edgar. Candlewick, 2011. [author interview] [publisher site]

Recommendation: Laura loved the elegant old house that she and her parents moved into, but she hated being different from everyone at school. Who else’s mother makes huge sculptures in the dining room? What other dad stays up all night writing?

Exploring the falling-apart rooms and imagining their former beauty is interesting, and soon Laura is trying to find out more about why there’s an Italianate villa in their dusty Australian town. Mrs. Murphy said that Mr. Visconti built it for his bride-to-be who never got to live in it.

When Leon moved in with his grandmother and joined Laura’s junior high class, he ignored the teasing better than she could. As she tracks down Mr. Visconti’s history, Leon’s viewpoints lead to other clues.

Can they discover why Mr. Visconti’s beloved never got to live in the beautiful house? Where is the statue which once stood in its gardens? And why did Leon suddenly move here, anyway?

Mystery, misunderstandings, and maybe a ghost! Plan on visiting The Visconti House with Laura and Leon soon! (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Stolen: A Letter to My Captor, by Lucy Christopher (book review) – kidnapped & brought to the Outback

May25

book cover of Stolen by Lucy Christopher published by Chicken House
This book scares me on so many levels, and there’s not a vampire or ghost or werewolf or war anywhere in it. How could Gemma’s parents cope with her disappearance? I just can’t imagine their terror and desperation.

May 25 is National Missing Children’s Day – it’s heartbreaking that this recognition even has to exist. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has resources so you can learn how to keep yourself and the children you know safe.

I’ve visited the Outback, so I know how far away from everything and everyone Gemma finds herself, out in the Red Center of Australia…
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Book info: Stolen: A Letter to my Captor / by Lucy Christopher. Chicken House, 2010. 304 pages. [author’s website] [publisher website] [book trailer]

My Book Talk: He watched Gemma for years – at the park, in her room – then he stole her, drugged her coffee, and took her away from her parents at the Bangkok airport. Now she’s in a desert, miles and miles from any town, continents away from her London high school, alone with him. Ty says that he’ll keep her there with him…forever.

What makes a man plan so intently, stockpiling food and supplies to last a decade, building a house in the depths of the Outback? How can get on the very same plane as Gemma or get a fake passport for her or smuggle her through airport security?

Will she be with Ty forever? How long will he leave her body to herself? Will she ever see her parents again? Under a sky filled with more stars than the cities can ever see, on the flatness of an empty land, Gemma’s questions fill her journal, going on and on like the red sands of the desert, as far as she can see…   (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.