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You. Take a look. You.
00:25S1
Hello and welcome to hear this. I'm Frances Kelland and this is the Vision Australia Library Radio Service, where we talk about books in the Vision Australia Library collection. We also have today on our show, Leanne Sergeant Vision Australia Library's Community Engagement Coordinator. So I hope you enjoy today's show. Once again, we're here with Leanne Seshadri. Leanne is the community Engagement coordinator here at Vision Studio Library. Hi, Lynn.
00:58S2
Hi, Francis. How are.
01:00S1
You? I'm very well, thank you. So we've got a bit of news coming up. But first of all, there's been a couple of things that have happened. The family history series and the Intergenerational Story time. How did they go?
01:14S2
Yeah, both really wonderful events. Frances So we've wrapped up our writing family history series, and that was led by Jonathan Butler, who's just a fantastic presenter, gave us such a brilliant insight into the creation of his own family history memoir, which has been published. It's called The Boy in the Dress, and it's available through the Vision Australia Library. So that was a wonderful couple weeks learning about research, about recreating the world of our forebears and how to creatively tell those stories. So that was, yeah, really, really wonderful series to be part of. Um, and you mentioned there our Intergenerational Story Time, which was on the 7th of September. So that was to celebrate Indigenous Literacy Day. And I'm not sure if your listeners are aware of our partnership with the Indigenous Literacy Foundation, the Vision Australia Library, where a supporter of the Indigenous Literacy Foundation and we supply Felix kits to the foundation which are gifted to remote Indigenous communities across Australia and so we work with the foundation to choose books which will be appropriate for those communities and create these really special kits which are then gifted, gifted to those, those partners of the Indigenous Literacy Foundation. And so we like to mark Indigenous Literacy Day, which is the key day for the foundation in terms of raising awareness about their work in raising literacy levels among Indigenous Australians. And we thought we would do a special themed Intergenerational Storytime, which was hosted here at Kooyong. So we had some wonderful presenters join our senior members of some of our recreational groups that come along with some little friends who joined us from a local kindergarten. And we had a Peter from a group called Wayne Era and he gave us a wonderful storytelling session. So he brought along a number of objects from his community, from his people and said their significance with our group. And we also had Holly McLennan Brown join us. And Holly is an artist. She's a First Nations artist, and she has created a beautiful artwork for Vision Australia for our Reconciliation action plan. So it was wonderful to have her explain the significance of the symbols she's used in their artwork. And it's a really, really beautiful piece of art. And then she led our group in a painting activity, so that was a lot of fun.
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Well, that would have been great. Is there any way that anybody can catch up on that? Sorry. Is it on a on the Vision Australia website or anything or.
04:05S2
We have an article about the about the story time. So that's sitting on the Vision Australia News page at the moment.
04:12S1
Oh great. So the news page of Vision Australia, that sounds like a great fun day and it seems to grow each year. And yes, they're.
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Doing really, really important work. So we're really proud to be one of their partners.
04:24S1
And looking forward. So there is the memoir writing course, not really looking forward that's already started, hasn't it? The memoir writing.
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Yeah. So our very popular Write Your Life memoir series we've just kicked off. We've had session one of the six week course. So look, not too late to join. If you're interested in learning more about memoir writing, this is the I think it's the fifth time we're running this series where we welcome a number of authors from Writers Victoria, who guide us in the craft of memoir writing. And so it's always a really, really meaningful experience to be part of that. We get to learn about each other's stories, learn how to tell these stories in creative ways. Yeah, it's really great, great series.
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And there's also Treat Yourself and this is coming up in October.
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So yeah, so a bit of time for that one. We are reviving our. Halloween special. Francis So we're going to do a late night Treat yourself. Halloween special. We're welcoming Alan Baxter, who's the head of the Horror Writers Association, and there will be some spooky storytelling involved.
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Lovely. I am a fan of spooky literary horror fiction. I love.
05:47S2
You. I'm so not.
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I know you either. People either really like it or they're like, No.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah. So my my colleague Tim, who probably a few of your members will be familiar with if they joined any of our workshops. Yeah. Tim is very excited about preparing our Halloween special for Treat Yourself. So registrations are open for that one and you can register via the website.
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Exciting but sad because it's always said to have the last in conversation for the year. But it's a brilliant one and it is nearly the end of the year. I often forget that. But yeah.
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What exactly feels like we're in the homestretch for the year? Yeah, I lost in conversation. We're giving lots of notice. It's in November, November the 17th, and we will be hosting the very beloved Judy known to, of course, you know, actor, writer extraordinaire. She's had amazing output over the last couple of decades. And she will be speaking about her latest novel, which is will be coming out this week, actually, Black Sheep. So, yes, Judy loves to write epic Australian stories. So we say Australian Sagas. And so she'll be sharing how she brings Australian history to life in her novels. And I'm really looking forward to chatting with her. And that conversation will be led by Stellar Glory.
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Oh, fantastic. So that's coming up in October and on November. Sorry. Yeah. So how do people register for that?
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Their registration will be opening soon on the Vision Australia website. So all of our events and programs you can register by going to Vision Australia. Org forward slash library and look for the what's on section. Yeah. And we've got so many of her titles in the collection. It's better time to start exploring, exploring some of her work.
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And what have you been reading?
07:48S2
Leanne Oh, what have I been reading? I have just finished The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man by Paul Newman, which is available in the Vision Australia Library. So that's a really interesting memoir that was published after his death in the 80s Paul and a journalist friend of his recorded a number of interviews with a view to publishing a memoir. The project kind of fell by the wayside, but the manuscripts of those interviews were found by his children after his death and have been created into this memoir. So really fascinating. If you're the kind of old Hollywood stories, he's a really, really intriguing figure that really comes across in the work. There's a marked lack of confidence in himself, which is really striking considering the types of roles that he played and his iconic place in Hollywood history. So, yeah, really, really interesting read there. I'm also starting to read The Parenting Revolution by Dr. Justin Coulson, and that is partly in preparation for our Stronger Foundation series, which will be starting in October. So that's a series for for parents and carers, which we're hosting at the Vision Australia Library. We're bringing in a number of parenting experts who will be helping out, participate and learn more about how to parent, particularly in the context of parenting children who have additional needs.
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When is that happening?
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So that's on Tuesday evenings in October, starting on the 3rd of October. So Dr. Dustin Johnson will be leading our first session. He'll be talking about resiliency in children, how we support our children to become more resilient and self-determining. And the subsequent sessions will be led by Lal Steyn. Should we talk about navigating our children's emotions? Our third session will be led by Siblings Australia, so they're a great organization who work with the siblings of children who have a disability. So recognizing that those siblings have their own particular needs and challenges in the context of a family where there is a child which might have higher needs. So they'll be looking at that sibling relationship and. A final session will be led by some of our team at Vision Australia from our Children and youth team, and they'll be talking about self care for parents. So all really worthwhile, important topics there.
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Thank you, Liane, for coming on to hear this and updating us on the library news and events and the things that are coming up and the things that have been. Thank you.
10:45S2
Great. Thanks, Francis.
10:52S1
And a big thanks to Leanne CJD there for her update on what's happening with Vision Australia Library. So let's start off with a sample of a book that Leanne mentioned. It's The Boy in the Dress and it's by Jonathan Butler on a balmy Townsville night in 1944. A young serviceman, Warwick Mele, is found beaten to death under a bridge. The army and police do not or will not conduct a proper investigation, and history forgets the killer. Until now, nearly 80 years on, Warwick's descendant, Jonathan Butler, dusts off the case and chases the leads that were there all along. The boy in the dress assumes secrets of life on the home front during World War II, where tensions between soldiers boiled over, new expressions of sexuality flourished, and the threat of invasion catapulted the status quo into disarray. The truth of this family legend and this little known chapter in Australian military history is more complex and engrossing than anyone could have imagined. Let's hear a sample of the Boy in the Dress by Jonathan Butler. It's narrated by John Robertson.
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On the evening of 15th August 1944, beside a creek in northern Queensland. A figure strode up to a young sleeping soldier and swung a blacksmith's hammer three times into his skull. The first two blows punctured the 23 year old's brain, spraying blood onto a nearby fence. The third blow created a deep gash across his face. The attacker kicked his victim in the crotch and face to a tooth rolled onto the ground. The soldier was left for dead on the cold grass. His mates soon found his broken body, his mouth choked with blood and rushed to find help. Medical staff at a nearby Army hospital monitored his condition for two days, but he didn't once stir from his coma. With head injuries so severe there was next to no hope of recovery. At 8:30 a.m. on 17th August 1944, 36 hours after the bludgeoning, he was declared dead. The victim was Warwick Miele. And though he died almost 50 years before I was born, his murder changed my life. Warrick was family. He was my grandmother's cousin. But I've always felt much closer to him than that. My first encounter with Warwick was in the form of a photograph taken in 1928, which I adored as a child. It was enclosed in a wooden frame, decorated with pressed flowers, and it hung next to my parents bed. My mother had placed it on her side, so she saw it before she slept. And when she woke, I'd often crawl on top of the fluffy doona to get a better look at the faded sepia image in the photo. Two smiling children stand on a patch of grass in front of wooden fence in Warwick's family home in Sydney. They are playing dress ups with one child dressed as daddy, the other dressed as mummy.
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That was the Boy in the Dress by Jonathan Butler. Jonathan is spelt j o n a t h a n j o n a t h a n butler is but l e r r but r, and that book goes for six hours, nearly seven hours, six hours, 56 minutes. And to a book that Leanne is reading currently. The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man by Paul Newman. And I'll just repeat this. Leon has already mentioned this, that in 1986, Paul Newman and his closest friend, screenwriter Stuart Stern, began an extraordinary project. Stuart was to compile an oral history to have Newman's family and friends and those who worked closely with them talk about the actor's life. And then Newman would work with Stuart and give his side of the story. The only stipulation was that anyone who spoke on the record had to be completely honest. That same stipulation applied to Newman himself. This project lasted five years and the result is an extraordinary memoir culled from thousands of pages of transcripts. The book is insightful, revealing, surprising. Newman's voice is powerful, sometimes funny, sometimes painful, always meeting that high standard of searing honesty. The additional voices from childhood friends and Navy buddies, from family members and film and theatre collaborators such as Tom Cruise, George Roy Hill, Martin Wright and John Huston that run throughout, add richness and color and context to the story Newman is telling. Let's hear a sample of this some unusual memoir, The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man, by Paul Newman. It's narrated by American actor Jeff Daniels.
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D.D. Alan Paul called me as I was finishing up Bonnie and Clyde and asked to see me about Rachel. Rachel, which was then called A Jest of God. I was very tired when I read the script. Bonnie and Clyde was an exciting but stressful experience, as when one has a child, you say never again. There was something about Rachel. Rachel that made me very uncomfortable. Maybe it dealt with things I was uncomfortable with. I met with Paul in Beverly Hills and I said, I don't like this. I don't think it is the right thing for me to do. That's precisely why I want you to do it, he replied. Joanne does not disagree with you about a lot of this, and that's why I want you. I want different points of view. One of Paul's great talents was to go right for the truth. Paul said he wanted to direct the film, which was important to get made because it was right for Joanne. Audiences, he said, were not getting the benefit of Joanne as an actress. So therefore, even though maybe I shouldn't direct, I'm going to.
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John Foreman. Paul thinks Joanne is a special creature endowed with magic, that he has to work very hard to come close to. As a result, he has put up with lots of stuff from her over the years, directing her in the effect of gamma rays on Man in the Moon marigolds. She was as difficult as I have ever seen a star be in all the years I have been in this business. It was part of her work process finding that difficult woman. Joanne had a hunch. I have always suspected that to be considered seriously as an actor, you either had to be prettier than everybody or better, and she chose better.
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That was a sample of the extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man by Paul Newman. That book goes for eight hours and 46 minutes. Paul is people. Newman is any woman, any woman. Now, the exciting news about Judy Nunn led me down a track of looking at all of the books we have in the collection by her, which are very many. Her latest black sheep will be released into the library in the next couple of weeks. So the last new release from Judy Nunn was Long weekend. This was published in 2022. So we'll have a sample of that. A captivating collection of six stories from Australia's master storyteller Judy Nunn. The long weekend, Tracy Eve, Jet, Mal and Daniel are looking forward, if a little nervously to their upcoming digital detox. No phones, no laptops, just a quiet weekend in a remote mountain shack. What could go wrong? The wardrobe. The next story is when journalist Nancy buys a rundown terraced house. She knows nothing about the previous owner until a discovery in an old wardrobe reveals the lives, loves and losses of Emily Roper, the Otto Bean empire to the homeless men and women who gather near the docks. The newly arrived Clive cuts an enigmatic figure. I'm just a bloke going through a period of adjustment, he tells himself. I'll be back on my feet soon. The next story changes as she celebrates her 65th birthday. Actor turned film producer Jacqui looks back on her seven decades and all the many changes in her life, not least the most recent and most surprising one of all. The next one is the house on Hill Street. It was such a respectable address, the perfect home for Professor Jameson and his family. But the neighbours are becoming concerned. Eileen Jameson and the boys haven't been seen for quite some time. So this is just a few of the stories that are in their few synopses. Let's hear a sample of The Long Weekend by Judy Nunn.
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The long weekend was Melanie's idea, not the long weekend itself, of course, but the way they should spend it. No mobile phones, no social media, no computers or devices of any sort, she said. Just the five of us alone in the wilderness, living the way people did 40 years ago. 16, more like Tracy remarked dryly. Mel ignored the comment. Trace was always the cynic among them. Three days in a remote mountain cabin communing with nature, hiking along bush tracks, gathering around log fires, burning of fossil fuel. What's not a fossil fuel? Eve interjected, polluting the atmosphere anyway. Oh, shut up, Trice, Denny said good naturedly. She was all for Melanie's idea. Go on, Mel, she encouraged. If we leave straight after work on the Friday, we could be up there by seven. It's only a couple of hours drive. A long weekend. Friday. Tracy again, The traffic will be hell. Then if we're prepared to get up at Sparrow's on the Tuesday and come directly into work, we'll have three full days. Mel rattled on and I'll tell you what, a full three days up there feels like a week even more.
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That was the long weekend published in 2022. Fairly recent one for Judy Nunn, but not her latest black sheep, which we will be getting into the library. Judy is Judy. Judy Nunn is enu double n and that bill goes for nine hours and 11 minutes. And while we don't have Judy Nunn's black sheep yet, there is another book in the collection that I looked up and it is called Black Sheep and it is by Nicholas Juice. Nicholas Joe sets out to discover Rogers, perhaps a distant relative, and his life in a remote Aboriginal community on Australia's farthest shore reading world literature and evolving his own radical philosophy. Rogers chosen motto, still pinned up in Burleigh, was a man's greatness is the funeral of his needs in his journey through the Gulf of Carpentaria. Searching for Roger. Nicholas Joyce also met a young gangly man, Miranda Yana, representative of some of the most deprived Aboriginal communities in Australia, who is committed himself to fighting for his people's rights in their vast and beautiful traditional territory. This book is the absorbing response of a modern writer to his own heritage. Let's hear a sample of Black Sheep by Nicholas Joss. It's narrated by Paul English.
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The first time I mentioned Roger Joss, it was as if I'd mentioned Santa Claus. The old woman shrieked with laughter. She came from Borroloola, but was living in Darwin now. That old man, I remember him. He was a good old man, she said, giving me the names of some people I could ask about him. She told me the first person I should talk to was Roy Hamer, and I wrote his name down. She laughed with high pitched hilarity, as you might add. Jerry Lewis or Jim Carrey. Roger. Joss may have been a good man, but he was obviously very funny to. On the database in the State Library of New South Wales. I found a dozen or so references to Borroloola, mostly to the on again off again Aboriginal land claims over the last 25 years to Aboriginal language material and to the town's appalling health issues. Roger, who died in 1963, is a sideshow to all this. But he was the focal point for a number of celebrity visitors to the town in the decades after the Second World War, of whom David Attenborough, with short back and sides and a lank blond fringe, was the biggest fish. A conversation with Roger Joss, in which he shared his pearls of wisdom was worth taking back to civilization. Not everyone was convinced, but impressions were mostly favorable. The trouble is, one account bleeds into another. A fragment of memory is spliced to a rumor, and stories grow even as the fact checkers busy themselves over particular point.
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That was Black Sheep by Nicholas Juice. Nicholas is Nikolas. Nikolas Jose is Jose Jose. And that book goes for seven hours and 30 minutes and there are a few other books by Nicholas Joseph in the collection are some novels The Avenue of Eternal Peace, about Wally Frith, a leading cancer specialist, travels to China in search of a possible cure by traditional Chinese medicine. Original face, which I think I read years ago. The drama begins with the body dumped in south western Sydney, a bit gruesome, hair skinned with no face. Lewis Lin. Taxi driver. Photographer. Recent arrival from Beijing happens to be at the scene. Detective Ginger Rogers and Shelley Sweat in pursuit. Lin finds himself drawn into a deadly immigration racket. And yes, you heard right, Detectives Ginger Rogers and Shelley Stewart. Paper Nautilus is another one in a small Australian town. Penny grows up to marry her childhood sweetheart, but few know the truth about her birth. The custodian set in South Australia, a group of childhood friends, seeks individual destinies. The novel spirals down the years and the rose crossing set off the African coast. A shipwreck strands English horticulturalist Edward Popple, his daughter Rosamund, and a sailor. Unbeknownst to them, the island harbours other refugees. An interesting writer seems to take on a lot of different topics and places. That's Nicholas Joyce. Nicholas Joyce was born in 1952 in London to Australian parents and he grew up mostly in Adelaide in South Australia. He was educated at the Australian National University and Oxford University and he worked in China from 1986 to 1990. And this book was shortlisted by The Age Book of the Year, the Black Sheep Book, in 2003. And just a reminder about the Virgin Australia Radio survey. We are wanting to get your feedback. So what do you like about the radio service or our radio service? Where are you tuning in from? How are you listening? Do you have a favourite program? Help shape the future of Vision Australia Radio to win one of five $100 Coles gift cards. You can visit the radio. Org that's RVA radio. Org and click on the home page link to take part and many things if you've already done so. And the survey closes October 1st, so there is still some time to get your feedback in if you haven't already. Thank you so much for joining us on here this today. I'm Frances Keelan and and thank you very much to Leanne CJD. If you would like to call the library for any reason, if you're interested in joining or you want to discuss the massive range of books that the library has, you can call 1300 654 656 1300 654 656. Or you can email library at Vision Australia. That's library at Vision Australia. Org. Thank you. Have a lovely week and we'll be back next week with more hearings.
