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The Cherry Picker's Daughter
This is the story of Kerry Reed-Gilbert, daughter of Kevin Gilbert, famous Aboriginal activist, writer, painter and actor. Told in the child’s voice and in the vernacular of her Mob, she speaks of love and loss, of dispossession and repeated dislocation. Kerry’s account highlights the impact of life as an Aboriginal state ward living under the terror of the Protection Laws. Despite this, she paints a picture of hard work and determination, with family unity giving them the strength and dignity to continue. Her father’s sister, whom she always called ‘Mummy’, raised his two children along with hers and others within the extended family. The book is a tribute to this truly remarkable woman: their tower of strength, love and selflessness.
240 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2019
About the author
Kerry Reed-Gilbert
8 books2 followersKerry Reed-Gilbert is a Wiradjuri woman from central New South Wales who has performed and conducted writing workshops nationally and internationally. She was the inaugural Chairperson of the First Nations Australia Writers Network (FNAWN) from 2012 to 2015 and continues today as a Director. Kerry is a former member of the Aboriginal Studies Press Advisory Committee, and her poetry and prose have been published in many journals and anthologies nationally and internationally, including in the Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature.
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
March 10, 2020
An important story in a 1950's Indigenous child's voice and quite a tribute to the determined family orientated woman who raised her.
The fruit picking and family focus was so similar to my own Mother's upbringing of the time. My mother, grew up in regional Victoria in a single parent family, with little money. They lived with wall-papered hessian walls (luxury), no running water, nor electricity and an outdoor dunny too.
Although, Kerry as a ward of the State in the times of Aboriginal protectionism was much more at risk of being removed from her family at the time.
Racism and Inter-generational trauma had their own far reaching impacts. But so does family strength and determination, they did good. Something for future generations to be proud of.
Really glad I picked this up as part of wanting to read books written by Canberra authors and as part of wanting to read more works by Indigenous writers.
The fruit picking and family focus was so similar to my own Mother's upbringing of the time. My mother, grew up in regional Victoria in a single parent family, with little money. They lived with wall-papered hessian walls (luxury), no running water, nor electricity and an outdoor dunny too.
Although, Kerry as a ward of the State in the times of Aboriginal protectionism was much more at risk of being removed from her family at the time.
Racism and Inter-generational trauma had their own far reaching impacts. But so does family strength and determination, they did good. Something for future generations to be proud of.
Really glad I picked this up as part of wanting to read books written by Canberra authors and as part of wanting to read more works by Indigenous writers.
January 26, 2020
‘I am the cherry picker’s daughter.’
Kerry Reed-Gilbert (24 October 1956 – 13 July 2019) was a Wiradjuri poet, elder, author and educator. She was a champion of up-and-coming Indigenous writers and an Aboriginal rights activist. She died the day after she’d provided the final corrections and amendments to the manuscript of ‘The Cherry Picker’s Daughter’.
‘The Cherry Picker’s Daughter’ is Kerry Reed-Gilbert’s memoir of childhood. Of growing up Aboriginal on the fringes of towns in regional New South Wales. Of fear. Of prejudice. Of disadvantage.
‘Everything we do is about avoiding the attention of the white people and, ultimately, the welfare, at all costs. It’s not safe to ask white people for anything.’
Her father’s sister, Aunty Joyce Hutchings, raised her and her brother Kevin after her father was imprisoned for murdering her mother. Aunty Joyce Hutchings, whom Kerry called Mummy, sounds like an exceptional woman. Looking after her own children as well as others. Working hard to keep them all fed and clothed. It is Aunty Joyce Hutchings who is the cherry picker.
‘Picking can be really hard work and we have to work harder than the white people, too. They get more money for a pound of cherries than we do. We only get ten cents a pound while they get twenty cents.’
Racism, persecution and poverty are all part of this story. I find it difficult to read: Kerry Reed-Gilbert, dead at 62. Born in the same year as me, but in vastly different circumstances. I read of how the family has to camp in various places when the river level rises, and they can’t get to their home. And then that home is lost.
‘I wonder why life has to be so bad to us that it wants to cause us all this misery. Our house burns down, my father’s locked in a bad place and I don’t know why.’
I read about the racism experienced by Kerry Reed-Gilbert and her family, the double standards applied, the constant fear of ‘the welfare’ coming and taking children away. I read about exceptional women who do their best to keep families together, and of the later (and different) struggles as families fracture.
Kerry Reed-Gilbert was a teacher and advocate. She was also the co-founder and inaugural chairperson of the First Nations Australian Writers Network (FNAWN). Her memoir is important: both a reminder to all of us of the continuing struggles faced by so many Indigenous peoples; and a tribute to an exceptional woman.
‘This book is to say thank you to my mother, Mummy, who took us home.’
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
Kerry Reed-Gilbert (24 October 1956 – 13 July 2019) was a Wiradjuri poet, elder, author and educator. She was a champion of up-and-coming Indigenous writers and an Aboriginal rights activist. She died the day after she’d provided the final corrections and amendments to the manuscript of ‘The Cherry Picker’s Daughter’.
‘The Cherry Picker’s Daughter’ is Kerry Reed-Gilbert’s memoir of childhood. Of growing up Aboriginal on the fringes of towns in regional New South Wales. Of fear. Of prejudice. Of disadvantage.
‘Everything we do is about avoiding the attention of the white people and, ultimately, the welfare, at all costs. It’s not safe to ask white people for anything.’
Her father’s sister, Aunty Joyce Hutchings, raised her and her brother Kevin after her father was imprisoned for murdering her mother. Aunty Joyce Hutchings, whom Kerry called Mummy, sounds like an exceptional woman. Looking after her own children as well as others. Working hard to keep them all fed and clothed. It is Aunty Joyce Hutchings who is the cherry picker.
‘Picking can be really hard work and we have to work harder than the white people, too. They get more money for a pound of cherries than we do. We only get ten cents a pound while they get twenty cents.’
Racism, persecution and poverty are all part of this story. I find it difficult to read: Kerry Reed-Gilbert, dead at 62. Born in the same year as me, but in vastly different circumstances. I read of how the family has to camp in various places when the river level rises, and they can’t get to their home. And then that home is lost.
‘I wonder why life has to be so bad to us that it wants to cause us all this misery. Our house burns down, my father’s locked in a bad place and I don’t know why.’
I read about the racism experienced by Kerry Reed-Gilbert and her family, the double standards applied, the constant fear of ‘the welfare’ coming and taking children away. I read about exceptional women who do their best to keep families together, and of the later (and different) struggles as families fracture.
Kerry Reed-Gilbert was a teacher and advocate. She was also the co-founder and inaugural chairperson of the First Nations Australian Writers Network (FNAWN). Her memoir is important: both a reminder to all of us of the continuing struggles faced by so many Indigenous peoples; and a tribute to an exceptional woman.
‘This book is to say thank you to my mother, Mummy, who took us home.’
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
September 12, 2021
A book all Australians should read - Kerry Reed-Gilbert's life speaks to the history and reality of life for Wiradjuri people in central NSW.
February 28, 2020
This book gives non-Indigenous people an insight as to the treatment of Indigenous Australians, even in the so-called more ‘progressive’ eras (which, realistically, have never existed). The constant sting of racism and threat of welfare hung over the heads of the author’s family, and yet she maintained an incredible outlook on life as a whole. The circumstances of her aunt caring for her were incredible too- what an amazing woman! To care so much for your family and manage whatever life throws at you and support them is incredible admirable. A brilliant memoir.
January 14, 2020
What an absolute gift Aunt has left, for writers, for the Koori community, for her family. Her memoir is beautifully written and navigates both the joy and pain of life without judgement. We are lucky to have this ode to the strength of Aboriginal women.
December 10, 2023
Reading this is like listening to a fascinating, proud, loving woman tell you about her childhood. It is written conversationally, with a focus on escapades and the endless summer that childhood seems to be. Reed-Gilbert doesn't skimp over how hard things were for her family, but the book celebrates the cocoon created by the woman who raised her, making it an often delightful read - and a reminder of the difference that great parenting can make, especially to traumatised kids. The afterword makes it clear how messy real families can be, but the nostalgia-infused telling works a treat for the main part of the book.
October 4, 2020
I loved the way this book was written. The author’s narrative style transports you right to the moment in her life when things were happening, it allows you to see into the thought process of a child who is realizing the world is racist and unfair. I highly recommend this book.
March 22, 2020
The Cherry Picker’s Daughter is the memoir of an indigenous childhood spent in NSW in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s. Kerry survived an extraordinary life and graduated from UTS in 1995 with a Bachelor of Adult Education, nevertheless the memoir is a tribute to her father’s elder sister who took Kerry and her brother Kevin into her household after their father killed their mother.
“Mummy” was a tenacious woman who was determined to keep her brother’s children together and not let them be separated and/or taken away as they were State Wards. This threat of being removed forcibly from Mummy’s was a constant nightmare as the “State” determined who could live where and with whom if you were of Aboriginal ancestry and this knowledge was a physical and psychological threat that is an overpowering weight throughout the book.
Their house was located on the outskirts of Condobolin beside a billabong of the Lachlan river from which they obtained their water. The house had hardened dirt floors as did the yard which had to be swept regularly and sprinkled with water to keep the dust down. Their clothes were meticulously washed, dried on the bushes and ironed with the hot iron heated on the stove. Mummy knew that Kerry and her brother would be criticised and any misdemeanour or failure to look good would be held against them and threaten their right to stay with her.
This is a truly amazing book in that by simply telling the stories and anecdotes of childhood Gilbert reveals the utter dichotomy between her childhood and any other Australian “white” child of the same period. This is story of childhood that many city Australians (like myself) did not know about but encourage everyone to read to address this veiled history.
“Mummy” was a tenacious woman who was determined to keep her brother’s children together and not let them be separated and/or taken away as they were State Wards. This threat of being removed forcibly from Mummy’s was a constant nightmare as the “State” determined who could live where and with whom if you were of Aboriginal ancestry and this knowledge was a physical and psychological threat that is an overpowering weight throughout the book.
Their house was located on the outskirts of Condobolin beside a billabong of the Lachlan river from which they obtained their water. The house had hardened dirt floors as did the yard which had to be swept regularly and sprinkled with water to keep the dust down. Their clothes were meticulously washed, dried on the bushes and ironed with the hot iron heated on the stove. Mummy knew that Kerry and her brother would be criticised and any misdemeanour or failure to look good would be held against them and threaten their right to stay with her.
This is a truly amazing book in that by simply telling the stories and anecdotes of childhood Gilbert reveals the utter dichotomy between her childhood and any other Australian “white” child of the same period. This is story of childhood that many city Australians (like myself) did not know about but encourage everyone to read to address this veiled history.
April 30, 2020
A strong own voices memoir to honour a life as an Aboriginal girl growing up in rural areas of New South Wales in the late 1950s, and the 60s. A family story of pain, poverty, hardship, and constant worry about The Welfare coming to take the children.
Family secrets are kept - Kerry and her brother live with Mummy, their father's sister, after their father murdered their mother and is in jail.
Mummy raises Kerry and Kevin as her own, adding to her already full household of children, several of whom are also with her due to the loss of their parents. This is the way for Aboriginal families, where generational lines are lineal, and doing the best for the kids is everything.
Mummy is the cherry picker, and orange picker, and any back-breaking, tiny wage scraping work she could find, to keep her family together, and give them a life. This memoir is a tribute to Mummy, an incredible Aboriginal woman who gave her all for her family.
Devastatingly, Kerry completed the final edits of this memoir, and then died at just 62. Aboriginal poor health and hardship continues, even today. A Close The Gap, as we lost a writer and storyteller much too soon.
Family secrets are kept - Kerry and her brother live with Mummy, their father's sister, after their father murdered their mother and is in jail.
Mummy raises Kerry and Kevin as her own, adding to her already full household of children, several of whom are also with her due to the loss of their parents. This is the way for Aboriginal families, where generational lines are lineal, and doing the best for the kids is everything.
Mummy is the cherry picker, and orange picker, and any back-breaking, tiny wage scraping work she could find, to keep her family together, and give them a life. This memoir is a tribute to Mummy, an incredible Aboriginal woman who gave her all for her family.
Devastatingly, Kerry completed the final edits of this memoir, and then died at just 62. Aboriginal poor health and hardship continues, even today. A Close The Gap, as we lost a writer and storyteller much too soon.
January 17, 2020
I nearly gave up on this book but then became absorbed and read it in a couple of sittings. It is a wonderful story of resilience and the strength of the family in aboriginal culture. Even after being jailed for murder Kevin Gilbert was taken back into the family. I am puzzled by Kerry’s feelings toward her father as it seemed she had a reasonable relationship with him in later life but in the postscript begs readers not to buy his works. A case of having to walk in someone else’s shoes I guess. Compulsory reading for those who insist that Australia is not a racist country.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 19, 2020
Loved it! Reminiscent of My Place this book takes non aboriginal australians on a guided walk through KRGs life from infancy to even the day before her death. We hear her speaking; the warm raw clipped vernacular lingo of her community. Welfare - the omnipresent threat to her family’s peace, looms large and Orwellian - an oxymoronic irony surely not lost on its victims. In Eurocentric Australia there is still precious little on KRG or her activist father...a sign of continued oppression. I welcomed this book and hope it may help us inch closer to treaty.
January 7, 2020
I really wanted to like this book after going to the launch in Hobart. Unfortunately I found it rather boring and repetitive. It was like ready a children's book (yes I know it was written as a memoir of childhood), there were areas that were interesting but it was more a book about 'I remember'.
May 1, 2026
This book could be divided into 2 distinct parts - Kerry's early years and those in later years.
The early years were depicted as happy years spent with a large extended family - many cousins, aunties and brothers and sisters. It was interesting to hear the family story told in a child's voice with Aboriginal nuance. This really made it come to life.
Although they were harsh years lived with the constant threat of "The Welfare" there were fun times with laughter. Kerry's family worked hard to survive, barely earning enough for food and clothes. And Mummy worked the hardest. They travelled to different areas to pick fruit in different seasons.
Later years unfortunately saw the family split with disagreements.
This is the story of Kerry Reed-Gilbert, daughter of Kevin Gilbert, famous Aboriginal activist, writer, painter and actor. Told in the child’s voice and in the vernacular of her Mob, she speaks of love and loss, of dispossession and repeated dislocation. Kerry’s account highlights the impact of life as an Aboriginal state ward living under the terror of the Protection Laws. Despite this, she paints a picture of hard work and determination, with family unity giving them the strength and dignity to continue. Her father’s sister, whom she always called ‘Mummy’, raised his two children along with hers and others within the extended family. The book is a tribute to this truly remarkable woman: their tower of strength, love and selflessness.
The early years were depicted as happy years spent with a large extended family - many cousins, aunties and brothers and sisters. It was interesting to hear the family story told in a child's voice with Aboriginal nuance. This really made it come to life.
Although they were harsh years lived with the constant threat of "The Welfare" there were fun times with laughter. Kerry's family worked hard to survive, barely earning enough for food and clothes. And Mummy worked the hardest. They travelled to different areas to pick fruit in different seasons.
Later years unfortunately saw the family split with disagreements.
This is the story of Kerry Reed-Gilbert, daughter of Kevin Gilbert, famous Aboriginal activist, writer, painter and actor. Told in the child’s voice and in the vernacular of her Mob, she speaks of love and loss, of dispossession and repeated dislocation. Kerry’s account highlights the impact of life as an Aboriginal state ward living under the terror of the Protection Laws. Despite this, she paints a picture of hard work and determination, with family unity giving them the strength and dignity to continue. Her father’s sister, whom she always called ‘Mummy’, raised his two children along with hers and others within the extended family. The book is a tribute to this truly remarkable woman: their tower of strength, love and selflessness.
October 27, 2021
The Cherry Picker's Daughter isn't so much a childhood memoir as the byline suggests, though it is that, but what it seems to be more forcefully is a love letter to the woman who raised the author. Joyce Hutchings was Kerry Reed-Gilbert's paternal aunt but known to Kerry as "Mummy", the only mother she would ever know.
It was early in Kerry's life that she came to be one of Mummy' children, which included Joyce's own children as well as both her younger brother and older brother's children. Being an Aboriginal family in mid-1900s Australia was to live in the shadow of The Welfare Man, Kerry and her brother were wards of the state even though they lived under Joyce's care. The memoir details living in rural Australia with a childlike delight. Kerry has captured her childhood perspective beautifully and in a way that many people cannot once they reach adulthood.
Through everything is the deep and undying admiration and love for her mummy. From the hard work and care she did to provide for her nieces and nephews, mostly solo while her husband worked on the rail, to the strength and resolve she showed when faced with unbearable challenges including a house fire and a racist neighbour shooting at her over the fence. An extraordinary woman.
It was early in Kerry's life that she came to be one of Mummy' children, which included Joyce's own children as well as both her younger brother and older brother's children. Being an Aboriginal family in mid-1900s Australia was to live in the shadow of The Welfare Man, Kerry and her brother were wards of the state even though they lived under Joyce's care. The memoir details living in rural Australia with a childlike delight. Kerry has captured her childhood perspective beautifully and in a way that many people cannot once they reach adulthood.
Through everything is the deep and undying admiration and love for her mummy. From the hard work and care she did to provide for her nieces and nephews, mostly solo while her husband worked on the rail, to the strength and resolve she showed when faced with unbearable challenges including a house fire and a racist neighbour shooting at her over the fence. An extraordinary woman.
July 18, 2020
At heart this book is a tribute to 'mummy' (and all the unsung women like her), an incredible Aboriginal woman who worked tirelessly to make a good life for not only her 3 biological children but the 5 others she took in and raised as her own. Joyce is a pillar for her people and an example to us all of strength and dignity in the midst of adversity. The racism both subtle and overt which the family endured is sickening and embarrassing for white Australians.
The Australian landscape was another quiet hero of the story.
I found the postscript which detailed complicated family dynamics and fighting in more recent years a sad note to end on. Despite obvious hardship, so much of the story was about overcoming. To finish it with ongoing relationship tensions was unfortunate and even a bit confusing as I was left with more questions that answers.
I enjoyed Kerrie's tone throughout the main body of the memoir and felt honoured to hear her story in her 'child's voice'. 'Mummy's' life and legacy of love will stay with me.
The Australian landscape was another quiet hero of the story.
I found the postscript which detailed complicated family dynamics and fighting in more recent years a sad note to end on. Despite obvious hardship, so much of the story was about overcoming. To finish it with ongoing relationship tensions was unfortunate and even a bit confusing as I was left with more questions that answers.
I enjoyed Kerrie's tone throughout the main body of the memoir and felt honoured to hear her story in her 'child's voice'. 'Mummy's' life and legacy of love will stay with me.
July 21, 2021
This childhood memoir deals with the confronting realities of racism and poverty as well as uplifting themes of love, strong family ties and overcoming hardships. While it was a different style of storytelling that was largely engaging, I found the writing a bit patchy and repetitive at times. The story had a powerful impact on me as it referenced towns and places I knew and the era in which I grew up. It made me reassess my memories and my perspective of those times and places. It also made me realise that we need to encourage indigenous authors to write more books like this so that we all have an opportunity to understand lives and experiences that are so very different to our own.
August 21, 2024
An eye-opening, important, confronting book about an Aboriginal family eking out an existence as fruit pickers in regional New South Wales. The fact that the book's events took place in the 1960s and 70s makes it even more distressing as that was not that long ago!
Government policies and the racism they engendered, volatile family relationships and the unwavering support (not to mention love, selflessness, protection and strength of the author's grandmother Mummy) are key motifs in this excellent book.
Highly recommended.
Government policies and the racism they engendered, volatile family relationships and the unwavering support (not to mention love, selflessness, protection and strength of the author's grandmother Mummy) are key motifs in this excellent book.
Highly recommended.
June 26, 2024
Growing up in country NSW in the 60s and 70s, Kerry tells her story in the voice of a child. There is joy and love but an underlying menace that’s made more poignant and unsettling because of the child-like nature of the narrative. Mummy is a wonderful character and I think we could all do with someone like her on our team. Sadly, Kerry died the day after finalising her memoir - would love to have read more from her.
March 20, 2021
A collection of memories told through the eyes of Kerry as a child. I had to pause reading during some of the incredibly sad moments like when their home burnt down, the horrible things Sam did, the racism and mistreatment they endured, and the many losses they suffered. Mummy is the heroine in this beautiful book - what an amazing, generous & tenacious woman she was.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 18, 2020
Kerry's story is one of struggle, but ultimately defined by love - the unbreakable bond between her and Mummy, her mother in everything but blood. A revealing memoir and a call to action. I certainly won't be consuming anything created by Kevin Gilbert, out of respect for Kerry and her family.
June 11, 2021
Review scheduled for Indigenous Literature Week at anzlitlovers.com (during NAIDOC Week 4-11 July 2021.
August 13, 2025
Don’t waste your time
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews