The joy of binge reading podcast
Join me and New Zealand's book podcast supremo, Jenny Wheeler as we discuss everything from landscapes, grazing life & writing at The joys of binge reading. Head to the website here to listen.
Insanity & the Adelaide Lunatic Asylum
Social alienation. That’s the best definition of an insane asylum. A place where people are shut away from society. In the 1800s, a person had to be declared insane before they could be admitted to a facility. However a doctor was usually only contacted after someone had been labelled insane due to their social behaviour [...]
South Australia & Goyder’s Line
Imagine having settled in a new country over one hundred and fifty years ago. You’ve been there for scarcely 30 years trying to carve out a business and home for your family. As a farmer you would need a good understanding about climate and growing conditions and if things turned pear-shaped due to flood, drought [...]
Four classic novels that have illuminated the reading world.
There are books that we read that stay with us forever. Something within the pages grabs at us, hurtling us forwards into a new world where characters become friends, or enemies, where adventure crosses the line to the depths of tragedy and where we are left to question choices made, loves lost, won or denied [...]
Conjuring the bush.
As a fourth generation grazier and author living 600 km northwest of Sydney my childhood was spent roaming the bush. Along with my brothers and sister we concocted stories and games, our outdoor adventures complimented by home schooling taught around the dining-room table with lessons sent through the mail from The Correspondence School in Sydney. [...]
Why we should remember them. Anzac Day
If you close your eyes you can see them resting during a break in the fighting on one of the Somme battlefields. The trench is cold and clammy, the men, quiet. Some sit on upturned wooden crates, others crouch low, their backs chilled yet sweating against the earthen wall. Filthy fingers hold hand-rolled cigarettes, lungs [...]
‘Robbery under arms’: The romance of the bushrangers
There was a wild colonial boy, Jack Duggan was his name He was born and raised in Ireland, in a place called Castlemaine He was his father's only son, his mother's pride and joy And dearly did his parents love the wild colonial boy Loved, admired, loathed. Songs sung about them and poems written. To [...]
Waltzing Matilda – A shearer’s strike, a suicide & Banjo: How our unofficial national anthem came into being.
By the 1950s Australia ‘rode on the sheep’s back’. It was a phase that came to symbolise what it was to be Australian. For a century, the wool industry had given Australia one of the highest living standards in the world and the economy rode high on wealth from primary exports. With the opening up [...]
Lightning Ridge – A town of contrasts
The name Lightning Ridge is said to have originated in the 1870's when the body of a grazier, his dog and 600 sheep were found, thought to have been struck by lightning. With such inauspicious beginnings, quirky seems a strange word to describe this north-west New South Wales town; yet this is a place where [...]
Upcoming events: April NSW Tour Dates – Stone Country
Stone Country Tour Dates NSW Mon April 15th: Bingara, NSW – 10.30 am. A morning with Nicole Alexander at Roxy Theatre Address: 74 Mailtand Street, Bingara, NSW. This is a free event. Bookings essential 02 6724 2064 Mon. April 15th: Scone, NSW – 6 pm. An Evening with Nicole Alexander at Hunt-a-Book. Address: Hunt-A-Book, 200 Kelly St, [...]