Catherine Meyrick's Blog, page 3

Excerpt – The Fires of Gallipoli by Barney Campbell

Today I’m delighted to be sharing an excerpt from Barney Campbell’s newly released novel The Fires of Gallipoli as part of a blog tour hosted by The Coffee Pot Book Club. The Fires of Gallipoli is heartbreaking portrayal of friendship forged between two British soldiers in the trenches of the First World War.

Blurb

Edward Salter is a shy, reserved lawyer whose life is transformed by the outbreak of war in 1914. On his way to fight in the Gallipoli campaign, he befriends the charming...

The O’Connors of Valencia Creek – Life on the Farm

My grandmother Catherine O’Connor c.1905
Aged 16

My grandmother grew up on her father’s farm at Valencia Creek in Gippsland, situated beneath the foothills of the Great Dividing Range and Mount Wellington. Her father, William O’Connor, had been born at Thebarton in South Australia in 1847. His parents, Patrick Connor and Mary White had migrated to Australia from Killarney in 1840 and by 1858 were farming at Pine Creek near Saddleworth. Patrick died in 1865 and William continued with the farm t...

My Reading – January 2025

Citizen to Soldier: Australia Before the Great War : Recollections of Members of the First A.I.F. by J N I Dawes and L L Robson
Most of the 416,000 men who enlisted in the 1st A.I.F. had their attitudes shaped during the first decade of Australian Federation.

Tin Man By Sarah Winman
All Dora Judd ever told anyone about that night three weeks before Christmas was that she had won the painting in a raffle.

The Ghost at the Wedding by Shirley Walker
All through the night Jessie is humming...

Excerpt – Lalji’s Nairobi by Nitin Nanji

Today I’m delighted to be sharing an excerpt from Nitin Nanji’s novel Lalji’s Nairobi as part of a blog tour hosted by The Coffee Pot Book Club. Lalji’s Nairobi is set in the early years of the twentieth century and is inspired by the stories of Indian migrants who settled in East Africa.

Blurb

British Gujarat, 1905.

Despairing of the social injustices and crippling taxes under the British Raj, Lalji, 19, flees to British East Africa hoping to build a better life using his natura...

One Minute Book Review – Citizen to Soldier: Australia Before the Great War : Recollections of Members of the First A.I.F. by J N I Dawes and L L Robson

Published in 1977, Citizen to Soldier draws together the recollections of soldiers who served during World War 1. These were collected as the result of an appeal made through newspapers in 1966. The soldiers’ own words are woven into a very readable narrative. The book looks not only at the soldiers lives before the war – in a much harsher but hopeful Australia – but concentrates on the wide range of reasons for enlistment. It contains some wonderful anecdotes including several about the way...

A Day at the Beach

Photographer: Rose Stereograph Co.

In the heat of summer, Australians enjoy nothing better than a day at the beach. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it was little different except that beach goers did not strip down to costumes flimsier than their underwear.

This delightful photograph was taken on a bright sunny day in the first decade of the twentieth century at Williamstown Beach in Victoria. This was one of a number of beaches popular not only with the locals but with th...

My Reading – December 2024

Crucible by J.P. McKinney
“Any erfs, madam?”
“Oui, m’sieur. Assayez-vous.”

Held by Anne Michaels
We know life is finite. Why should we believe death lasts forever?

The Season by Helen Garner
I pull up at the kerb. I love this park they train in.

Christmas 1914

Christmas 1914 is remembered mainly as the first of World War 1, and for the Christmas Truce on the Western Front when British and German soldiers met in No Man’s Land and exchanged gifts, and even played games of football.

As part of the British Empire, Australia too was at war but had not yet begun to truly count the human cost of war. There had been casualties as a result of Australia’s first actions of the war. Able Seaman Bill Williams and Capt. Brian Pockley died on 11 Sep 1914 during a...

My Reading – October & November 2024

The Gates of Memory: Australian People’s Experiences of Memories of Loss and the Great War by Tanja Luckins
On 11 November 1993, the 75th anniversary of the end of the Great War, an Unknown Soldier was entombed in the Hall of Memory at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra.

Digger Smith and Australia’s Great War: Ordinary Name – Extraordinary Stories by Peter Stanley
Digger Smith, one of the least known of [C J]Dennis’s works, has inspired this book. As I read Dennis’s Digger Smith I wo...

Madeline’s Boy by Sara Powter

Today I’m delighted to be sharing Sara Powter’s newly released novel, Madeline’s Boy as part of a blog tour hosted by The Coffee Pot Book Club. Madeline’s Boy is the latest book in Sara’s Convict Birthstain Collection and is set in England in the 1830s and New South Wales in 1840.

Blurb

The race to protect an orphaned boy.
All is not straightforward when money and titles are involved.

Orphaned, afraid and on the run, Chip must Flee.

Madeline was his mother’s best friend. Maddie...