The Banksia House Breakout in Aussie Readers

Apr 17, 2024 Brenda rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: aussie-authors, 2021-release, contemporary-fiction, debut, own-read, 3000-2024

Michael sold his eighty one year old mother, Ruth Morris's home, the home she'd lived in with her beloved husband all their married life. Now Ray was gone, Michael was micro-managing Ruth, and moving her into a nursing home was his decision. Banksia House was a lovely place, and Ruth, although sad, soon made friends. Jean and Beryl kept her company during the day, but when Ruth heard her oldest and dearest friend, Gladys, was dying in Brisbane, she was determined to visit her one more time. But ...more

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Oct 01, 2021 Helen rated it it was amazing

Shelves: review-copy-from-author

What an exciting fabulous debut, this one had me turning the pages as fast as I could without missing a word but not wanting it end I wanted to spend so much more time with these awesome people that James Roxburgh has bought to life, this is a great story one that I do hope you pick up it is well worth reading.

Ruth Morris might be eighty one but she can still fend for herself except that her son Michael decides she can’t anymore after a small fall, she has lost her beloved husband Ray and is mis What an exciting fabulous debut, this one had me turning the pages as fast as I could without missing a word but not wanting it end I wanted to spend so much more time with these awesome people that James Roxburgh has bought to life, this is a great story one that I do hope you pick up it is well worth reading.

Ruth Morris might be eighty one but she can still fend for herself except that her son Michael decides she can’t anymore after a small fall, she has lost her beloved husband Ray and is missing her best friend Gladys, when Michael makes her sell her house sign the control of her life and money over to him and move into aged care. Ruth is devastated at losing her independence.

Within days she has made friends at the home and has also found out her friend Gladys is dying who is living in Brisbane and she desperately wants to see her before it is too late and say goodbye. When Michael refuses to help her she gets help from Jean and Beryl her new friends, then Beryl, Ruth and Keith the escape artist at the home ends up on a journey from Sydney to Brisbane that is fraught with problems and lots of ups and downs not to mention the police, but there are so many laughs and smiles along the way.

I loved seeing Ruth go from strength to strength on this journey, along with getting to know Beryl so well and what her life was like and then Keith who opened up so much on this trip as well, he became such a different person, the people they meet along the way, backpackers and surfers and the wedding couple added to the story so much the things they did and all of the fun they had, had me cheering them on, but no matter what happened they never gave up on getting to Brisbane. I loved seeing romance bloom, I was smiling very much.

This is a beautifully written story that has lots of emotions, it is heart-warming and so much fun, yes there were tears but it shows that just because you are older it doesn’t mean you can’t be independent and have fun. I loved this story and I do highly recommend it, huge congratulations James Roxburgh on a brilliant debut.

My thanks to the author for my copy to read and review
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Apr 05, 2022 Catsalive rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: amw, 2022

An amusing & heartwarming, octogenarian, road-trip tale. I enjoyed this debut novel that shines a light on the possibilities of elder abuse by both family & the system without getting bogged down in the darker theme.

Ruth is shuffled willy-nilly into a residential home by her son & left to her own devices with no family visits, & no thought for her own needs or wants. When Ruth wants to visit her dying friend in Brisbane, Michael vetoes it, which leads to the great breakout. Ruth, Beryl & Keith t ...more

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Nov 01, 2021 Jenny (Bookbookowl) rated it it was amazing

Thank you to author James Roxburgh, for providing me with a copy of this book, in exchange for an honest review!

Ruth has just, reluctantly, been moved into a nursing home by her son. Between busy phone calls, he assures her it will be just fine. She’ll love it. But with the death of the first friendly face she met and a horrible nurse all the other residents avoid at all costs, Ruth is quite sure she is NOT going to like it at Banksia House. To top it off, her oldest friend has called to say she ...more

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Sep 04, 2021 Bree T rated it really liked it

Shelves: australian, contemporary, road-trippin

There’s definitely a trend towards books with older protagonists at the moment. This month alone I had 3 for review. I’ve not read a lot of books narrated by people of this age – Ruth is 81, a widow and has just been basically forced by her son Michael to sell her home of 50+ years and enter the Banksia House Retirement Home. She has a little bit of a rough time settling in and when she hears that her best friend of a lifetime is on borrowed time 12 hours north in Brisbane, Ruth is desperate to There’s definitely a trend towards books with older protagonists at the moment. This month alone I had 3 for review. I’ve not read a lot of books narrated by people of this age – Ruth is 81, a widow and has just been basically forced by her son Michael to sell her home of 50+ years and enter the Banksia House Retirement Home. She has a little bit of a rough time settling in and when she hears that her best friend of a lifetime is on borrowed time 12 hours north in Brisbane, Ruth is desperate to get to her to say goodbye. But with her son too busy with work and dismissive of her concerns, it’s up to Ruth to take matters into her own hands and what ensues is a crazy road trip north.

One of the reasons I was looking forward to this one is because I know that stretch of coast so well. I’ve lived in Sydney, Newcastle and Port Macquarie and we spent most holidays of my childhood, driving to the Gold Coast or Sunshine Coast. The roads have improved over the years and it’s a much easier drive now than it was back when I was a child but it’s still gruelling, especially for people in their 80s, when there’s only one driver.

It’s a very…..incident packed road trip and I’ll admit that at times, I found it to be just…too many things happening in such a period of time. The humour wasn’t necessarily my sort of humour although there’ll be plenty of people that enjoy the hijinks the elderly people get up to. It namechecks some lovely places along the coast, such as Forster and Coffs Harbour (mentions to the Big Banana and Marine Conservation Centre) as well as places like Yamba and Byron Bay. There’s a bit of a detour out west inadvertently after a wrong turn at what has to be the biggest round-a-bout in the world (seriously, how did that happen, haha, there’s a huge difference between the road they should’ve taken and the one they did).

But where I think this book shines is the way it looks at agency and how it can be stripped from the elderly. Even in the cases where the reasoning behind it is not necessarily malicious and that the person who is granted Power of Attorney, etc, believes they are doing the right thing it can be incredibly limiting and crushing on. Particularly when the POA uses the excuse of protecting them from themselves, even when they’ve shown no indication that they might be deteriorating in mental ability to think for themselves.

This is what happens to Ruth. She does have a fall and so her son believes that the best thing to do is to sell her home in Ryde and put her in a nursing home where she can move through the levels of care as required. This is against what Ruth wants but Michael is far too busy and stressed about his own life to listen and her other son lives overseas and is happy to go along with what Michael has suggested. Not only is he oblivious or uninterested in how Ruth feels about moving and how much she misses the idea of her house, he’s not happy to facilitate her going to see her oldest friend when she learns that he’s dying and then he deliberately obstructs her when Ruth takes matters into her own hands.

I think the thing that concerned me was that someone like Ruth, should be allowed to come and go as she pleased. She’s still physically and mentally healthy – the idea of her “running away/escaping” from the nursing home seemed wrong somehow. She should’ve been allowed to go out any time she liked, not kept locked inside. I didn’t realise she was in an area that specified such a high level of restriction, considering her health. What would’ve been more suitable for her would’ve been an independent living apartment or something, where she could’ve moved into the nursing home later when she was perhaps not so mobile and required more assistance. But this was another thing Michael seemed unwilling to consider, wanting to wash his hands of anything. He’d “done the right thing” by placing her somewhere to be looked after, ignoring the fact that this was not what Ruth wanted. And when she tries to explain things to him, he is uninterested and frustrated with her lack of just….doing what he tells her. Both my parents have filled POA roles for their own parents and it’s made me realise what an important role it is and how it can be abused, both blatantly and deliberately as well as inadvertently as well. In particular, Michael’s opinion on what POA meant about Ruth’s money, was very wrong to me.

Although most of the action actually takes place away from the nursing home, this book also includes the staffing issues and also how elderly people can be vulnerable even within a place that should be safe to them. There’s been a lot about nursing home care lately, especially with the Royal Commission into Aged Care and the impact that the corona outbreak had on the community also. The decision for a family member to go into one wouldn’t be easy and there’s a lot to consider with unfortunately, cost being one of the biggest determining factors. These days, many aged care homes are run for profit as businesses, leading to the inadequate staff to patient ratios and sometimes indifferent care. It’s also a low paying industry as well with a high turnover of staff.

I enjoyed this – a lot of humour on the surface but there’s a lot of serious undertones that I feel could provoke many conversations about how family members can and should be cared for in their older years and how we might be able to do better.

***A copy of this book was provided by the publisher/author for the purpose of an honest review*** ...more

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