Yesterday I had the pleasure of launching this terrific new novel by Deborah Burrows.  It’s Deborah’s first novel and I’m already waiting for the next one.  A Stranger in my Street is set in wartime Perth -  I live in Perth but am ashamed to say I knew next to nothing about life here in the 1940s.  At the end of the book I knew a lot and I had learned it in the most delightful way -  through an intriguing and romantic murder mystery.  But there is much more to this story than those elements.  A Stranger in My Street is a skilled exploration of social relationships on the home front and it’s grounded in solid research.  Deborah is a lawyer who specialises in medical history and also has a post-graduate degree in history.  She  also understands the art of  weaving her research through the story in subtle and enriching ways.

I particularly enjoyed the voice of the protagonist -  Meg Eaton – an intelligent, thoughtful young woman who has been robbed of her first love by the war.  As she struggles to recover from her loss and to do what so many women were doing – keep her chin up and keep on keeping on – she is drawn to a mysterious stranger who seems dangerously close to a horrible crime.

This is one of those books where you think – I’ll just read to the end of this chapter before I put out the light – and then you find you just have to go on reading.  I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I did.

Here’s a link to a piece I wrote a few days ago for The Hoopla, about the con-trick of post-feminism.  Do check it out if you have time, and if you haven’t visited The Hoopla before you’ll find it’s home to a lot of really interesting people and topics.

http://thehoopla.com.au/back-feminism/

Amid the Mothers’ Day hype what was bugging me last week was not just the commercialisation but the treatment of women deemed by some as unworthy of or inappropriate for motherhood.  And discrimination against mothers always leads to discrimination against their children.

It seems we always need someone to demonise and some mothers must constantly battle disapproval and struggle for acceptance and legitimacy.  Foremost among these are lesbian couples and hard-up single mothers.

Two women in a loving long-term relationship, raising their own or adopted children, may tick all the ‘good mother’ boxes, but they still have to contend with disapproval, suspicion, and abuse, all of it grounded in ignorance and prejudice.  And it’s fuelled too by the political hypocrisy and cowardice of politicians and church leaders.  This failure of political and religious leadership that denies legitimacy to same sex couples and parents is a cancer at the heart of what claims to be a civil society.  After all the abuse visited on children and then excused or covered up by the churches the audacity of their leaders in making judgements about who can be a family and who is appropriate as a mother is deeply offensive.  Equally offensive is the hypocrisy of a Prime Minister who exercises her own rights to eschew tradition and belief, but lacks the political courage to grant those rights to others.

Celebrity single mothers are viewed as brave and independent because they are rich and famous. But single mothers struggling on low incomes or welfare are always in the wrong.  They face constant judgements about their character and morals.  If they stay home with the kids they are bludgers, if they go out to work they are accused of neglecting their children.  Whether or not they are doing a good job as mothers is  irrelevant, they just have to be punished for being single and poor. Governments of both persuasions that extol the importance of working families, of battlers and the saintly state of motherhood then proceed to crush battling single mothers with schemes that cut welfare and drive them back to work, and to work longer, harder and frequently in demeaning, and poorly paid jobs.  We love mothers unless our taxes are used to help support them and their children.

It seems that there is always some ignorant, narrow minded, ill-informed person who is ready to pass on a tale of a single mother abusing her kids, or bludging the system,  and another who will nod judiciously and whisper totally unfounded tales of the deviance of lesbian mothers.

So it seems to me that the rest of us need to speak up for those mothers.  To start spreading true, moving and inspiring stories of struggling single mums, who are doing a great job, and women in a same sex relationships who are raising healthy, well balanced children.   After all we need only look around us, read the papers, and watch TV to see the multitude of instances of married and de facto heterosexual couples whose parenting is cruel, abusive, neglectful and frequently criminal.

In a box of treasures from the past I have a small peacock made of purple felt and decorated with a few sequins, and a scarlet felt tomato with a green felt stem and leaves.  Over decades the peacock has lost some sequins and the tomato has shed a few leaves, but they are no less precious.

They’re Mother’s Day gifts made for me by my sons in their first year of primary school.  Both are now men and are of ages it seems indelicate to mention, and since then they have both given me all sorts of  simple, memorable gifts on various occasions. But the peacock and the tomato are unique because they capture the meaning of  Mother’s Day – a shared and intimate connection between mother and child.

So perhaps it’s not surprising that as Mother’s Day approaches I am raging, as I have been for years now, about its commercialisation.

I’m a big fan of mothers and motherhood.  I believe that being a mother is a privilege and a joy, and being a parent is life’s most powerful and character building experience. It’s also incredibly hard work, emotionally and physically challenging, and frequently a complete pain in the bum. So I’m attached to the concept of honouring mothers and what they mean to us.

But the emotionally manipulative grab bag of drivel used to sell gifts from cars and dishwashers to fluffy slippers and hot water bottle covers, bombards children of all ages.  The price of flowers shoots up, and restaurant prices double to take advantage of both our love of our mothers and our guilt if we’ve neglected them.  When we’re brow beaten by advertising it’s hard to get back to the real meaning of Mother’s Day and harder still to encourage our children and grandchildren to understand its significance.

So what will I being doing on Mother’s Day?  Well I’ll get a card from my elder son who lives on the other side of the country, and we’ll have a conversation on Skype as we frequently do on weekends.  And I’ll get a card and a visit from the one who lives in the same city; we might go out for a coffee or a walk, because Mother’s Day is just one day of 365, and what really matters does not come in posh gift wrapping on Sunday but what happens on the other 364 days.

There’s a whole lot more I want to say about mothers but I might leave that until after Mother’s Day – so watch this space!

I hope you have a very special day with your mother, your children and grandchildren or all three.

Isn’t this cool?  A whole new website; scary though because the blog is up front so you’ll see at a glance whether or not I’ve updated it.  Based on my past record that’s a bit of a worry, but I’m a reformed character now (no sniggering please)!  I really am determined to get to grips with this blogging business because  I’m  quite stirred up about a lot of things right now.

For five years, back in the 1980s, I wrote an opinion column in a group of newspapers here in in Western Australia. In those days I was quite happy to air my views to anyone who wanted to hear them and quite a lot who didn’t.  Decades earlier when, aged 16,  I told my parents I wanted to be a writer, my Mum said that wouldn’t do at all because women writers are bossy, interfering and opinionated. So guess what -  I proved her right -  at least in my own case.  And now   my inner columnist is  ready to be let loose again. I hope you’re going to help me with this and start responding -  I don’t want to have to do this all on my own.

And I’ll also be using this space to talk everything from politics to food porn, sexism, feminism, ageism, makeover culture, education, reading and writing, about books, films and favourite television programs. Which reminds me that I recently saw Best Exotic Marigold Hotel -  which I loved (and not just because Bill Nighy was in it)!  The week before I saw the film I read the novel on which it’s based.  The book has several more major characters  and some of the characters’ story lines have been merged into others on the screen.  It’s a terrific example of why adaptation is so challenging. To cram a full length  book into a 90 minute film is a big ask.  Something’s got to give if a novel rich in characters and action is to make a successful transition to the screen. The book is by one of my favourite authors, Deborah Moggach,  and was  originally published as These Foolish Things but there is now a new edition with the same title as the film. If you’re interested in the adaptation of novel to film this is a particularly interesting example.  Let me know what you think of either or both.

Before I wind up I just want to say a big thank you to Mark Harding of Momentum Books who built this website for me and put up with my not knowing what I wanted and changing my mind all the time.  I’ll be publishing a long essay on ageing with Momentum Books online in a couple of months time but in the meantime have a look at their website www.momentumbooks.com.au.  I will never give up on print books which are my great love, but there’s no doubt that the future is digital and provides terrific opportunities for new writers.

Anyway – that’s all for now, do check in again soon.

My all new website lizbyrski.com is currently under construction, due to launch on May 1! Be sure to check back for all the details.

Yesterday ABC Radio replayed my Literary Lunch talk from last year. If you missed it and would like to listen you can find it here.

http://www.abc.net.au/nightlife/stories/3221831.htm

No, I didn’t stay up and I didn’t see the fireworks.  I thought I’d be better placed to start 2012 with 8 solid hours sleep behind me.  But I’m looking forward to a great year and wish you all peace, happiness and good health.  Hopefully it will be a year in which we can all try to do a few things to make the world a better place.

This is a picture of Pollocks Toy Museum in London.  It’s well worth a visit and you can read my story about it and about the Cartoon Museum here:  http://www.theaustralian.com.au/travel/world/all-dolled-up-with-plenty-to-enthral/story-fn302659-1226233423039

 

Well it’s almost upon us so Merry Christmas everyone.  I wish you a day of joy and relaxation with family and friends, and lots of turkey and pudding all of it cooked by someone else.

If you’ve got time to relax with a good book over the holiday try Started Early Took My Dog by Kate Atkinson, My Dear I Wanted to Tell You by Louisa Young is a beautiful love story set in the Great War,  and Caroline Overington’s Matilda is Missing is an intruiging and compelling read.  I also loved David Lodge’s A Man of Parts which is a fictionalised biography of HG Wells, and Frank Moorhouse’s novel Cold Light - the third and final book in his League of Nations Trilogy – fascinating if you are interested in politics and social issues in Australia from the 1950s onwards.  And for some  fifties and sixties British nostalgia Nigel Slater’s memoir in food, Toast, is an absolute delight.  Phillips Henscher’s King of the Badgers won’t appeal to everyone, but I really loved it.

And don’t miss Mr. Chartwell - a hilarious and moving story of Churchill’s Black Dog in which the Dog is a larger than life characer.

I also loved Frances Osborne’s biography of Idina Sackville - The Bolter –  the woman whom Nancy Mitford used as a model for her character ’the bolter’ in Love in a Cold Climate. And Evelyn Juers’s House of Exile is a fascinating  biography of  Heinrich and Nellie Mann in the south of France and later in California, from the mid-1930s until 1950, and features others such as Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, Franz Kafka and Nettie Palmer.

My favourite re-reads this year have been Winifred Holtby’s -  South Riding which is now also a stunning 3-part series available on DVD, and Anita Brookner’s Hotel du Lac.

Of course you could always doze in the sunshine or have an early morning swim at the beach instead, and frankly that takes a lot of beating over the holidays.

I’ll be making some changes to this blog in the New Year which (I’m told) will make it easier for me to use and will encourage me to post more often …  stop laughing, I know you’ve heard that before but people can change you know.

Thanks to you all for your wonderful support of my books during what has been a hard year for many writers and the book business generally, I am very fortunate.  There will be a new book in the latter half of 2012 –  I’ll tell you more about it nearer the time.

With warmest wishes for Christmas and the New Year

Liz

Last month I was invited to speak at the national conference of the Older Women’s Network.  It was a great evening in the glorious setting of the Point Walter Conference Centre, and it was terrific to spend time with such interesting and dynamic women who are all involved in this important and valuable network for older women.

The WA organisers this year had gone to great lengths to provide an evening of friendship and entertainment.  L-R  Eileen Ward wo horganises publicity, Sue Ash former CEO of WACOSS,  OWN President Ruth Kershaw, Irina Cattalini current CEO of WACOSS, and Sally Jones, OWN National Convener.

And here I am with OWN President Ruth Kershaw.

June and Lou Smith and their band were such a delight playing plenty of old favourites and everyone was up on their feet and dancing.  A great night thanks OWN -  it was lovely to meet such inspirational and entertaining women.