Sally Morgan (text), Ezekiel Kwaymullina (text) Craig Smith (illus) Flying High, Omnibus/Scholastic, 1 April 2015, 64pp., $9.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781742990705 Larni is excited – soon she will be getting on a plane and flying from Perth to Port Hedland to visit her grandmother. She can’t wait to fly and to see the ground from up high. But she’s worried as well, because she’s not very good at school and doesn’t seem to have a special talent for anything like other people do. But at her grandmother’s house, Larni discovers there is something she’s good at. This is a good book for newly independent…
Author: Admin
Kathryn Lomer has written several YA books, all quite different from each other. Her latest book continues to explore her interest in environmental issues. Kathryn graciously agreed to answer our questions. Thanks to Kathryn, and her publishers UQP, who facilitate such conversations. How did you get started as a writer? I began by writing short stories as I really loved that genre. I was very much inspired by stories by Canadian writer Margaret Atwood and also Australian writer Carmel Bird. I won a competition or two, had a few stories published, and continued from there. Which author(s) were/are your inspiration…
Janeen Brian (text), Cheryll Johns (illus.) Silly Squid: poems about the sea, Scholastic, 1 June 2015, 32pp., $24.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781742990965 Any child captivated by ocean going creatures will enjoy discovering these animals of the deep sea through Janeen Brian’s short form poetry, combined with delightful full colour illustrations depicting each animal. Combining facts with the poetic prose, each animal is given ample limelight and the addition of non-fiction facts will satisfy trivia-loving children. Whilst popular sea creatures such as the octopus, starfish and shark are featured, the author has ensured some lesser known sea creatures are introduced including, the sea…
I am sure you all know Megan Daley’s blog. She very kindly let us use and adapt her author questions, and we liked them so much, they have used by a number of authors now. Here is a Q and A with Karen Wood, who has a new series of books out now for younger readers. Tell us about your latest book. TRICKSTARS is a series of six chapter books for 7 – 10 year old girls. Triplet sisters, Ruby, Lexie and Kit dream of a life far from Windara Farm, performing spectacular tricks on their beautiful gypsy cob horses. Then Ruby…
A B (Banjo) Patterson (text), Mark Wilson (illus.), We’re All Australians Now, HarperCollins, 23 March 2015, 32pp., $24.99, ISBN 9780732296476 Andrew Barton Patterson (1864-1941) was known as A B Patterson or Banjo Patterson. He was a journalist, an author, a war correspondent, a solicitor and a soldier, but he most famously became one of Australia’s favourite poets. In 1915 he wrote a poem called We’re all Australians Now, as a letter to the Australian troops fighting in WWI in Gallipoli and the Dardanelles. Even though Patterson wrote this poem 100 years ago, it is still a popular choice for inclusion in ANZAC…
Margaret Wild (text), Karen Blair (illus.), Our Baby, Working Title Press, 32pp., $24.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781921504785 The title is a little misleading because this picture book is about all sorts of babies in different families doing a variety of activities. Each situation is always concluded by stating what ‘our baby’ does but this is not the focus of the book. It is more of a general overview of the life of babies rather than a close look at a girl and her baby sibling, even though these two appear on the cover and title page. The text and illustrations are…
Aaron Blabey, Pig the Fibber, Scholastic, 1 May 2015, 28pp., $16.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781743629062 I adore everything about this second adventure of Pig the Pug who would ‘often tell lies just to get his own way’. What’s more he cleverly ensures that delightful but dim dachshund Trevor, always gets the blame. Every scene is a delight because both characters are so strong on the page with a heady mixture of humour, innocence, evil intent, chaos and mayhem. Picking a favourite page is almost impossible – is it Pig grinning wildly while dancing in a hula skirt revealing every one of…
Angelica Banks, A Week Without Tuesday : a Tuesday McGillycuddy adventure, Allen & Unwin, May 2015, 400pp., $15.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781760110376 Strange things are happening in the world of Tuesday McGillycuddy – writers are being abducted and then deposited thousands of miles from home, winged dogs are falling out of the sky and mountain ranges are growing and crinkling up the atmosphere. This is possibly because there is something wrong ‘there ‘, the world of story which exists at the end of a silvery thread of imagination, a magical place that is the collective secret of every writer that ever…
Garth Nix, To Hold the Bridge: a tale of the Old Kingdom and other stories Allen & Unwin, June 2015, 488pp., $19.99 (pbk), ISBN 97817423316559 While I admit that short stories (although some of them are not so short in this particular book) are not normally my preferred form of literature, I have to say that I did enjoy this collection. I have been a long time fan of Garth Nix’s work and this collection certainly showcases his ability, in so many different ways. To Hold the Bridge he writes tales of the future, fantasy, horror, science fiction and…
Claire Saxby (text), Lizzy Newcomb (illus), My Name is Lizzie Flynn: a story of the Rajah Quilt. Black Dog Books, 1 June 2015, 32pp., $24.95 (hbk), ISBN 9781922179913 What a delight it is to come across an Australian picture book that draws on an actual historical artifact from the National Gallery of Australia and uses it as a means of exploring one small aspect of the transportation of female convicts to Australia. The Rajah Quilt was pieced together by unknown convict women aboard the Rajah on its 1841 voyage from England to Van Diemen’s Land. The story is told through the young eyes…