Sky Larks launch at Hopetoun

The launch of the Southern Scibes latest book 'Sky Larks' took place at Hopetoun last night and was a wonderful evening of recitations, celebrations and entertainment.

I was delighted to be invited as Master of Ceremonies for the event, which included performances by local soprano Evelyn Arnold, the Qualup Choir, recitations from 'Sky Larks' by some of the contributing poets, a heartfelt official launch by poet and author Graham Kershaw from Denmark and wonderful music from a fabulous Denmark duo, Tony and Jude (two of the three socks in Jazz trio 'Odd Socks' from Denmark.......and a fabulous pair of socks they are too.)

Tony had written the music and adapted the lyrics of three of the poems in 'Sky Larks' which were very well received by the crowd. It would be good to see and hear a lot more from these musicians who effortlessly entertained throughout the evening with a guitar, a violin and two lovely voices. What really was the icing on the cake for me was watching local violinist Ron (who is no spring chicken, but plays like one) join the duo and jam away with nothing to use as music other than his ear! Quite brilliant.

It was a top night in the Hopetoun rural community which is still recovering from the shock of the Ravensthorpe mine closure late last year. I was given a quick tour of the town before the book launch by Southern Scribe Eve and her husband Frank, and was impressed at the infrastructure and money poured into the town, which looks fabulous. Not so impressed are some of the locals.

"BHP......Buggered Hopetoun Permanently. That's what I call it."said barman Cocky.

It is very sad to see so many new homes and buildings totally empty and deserted in the little seaside town and to hear of the huge financial losses and pain of those who were left holding the baby after BHP threw out the bath water.

However the true country spirit always shines through and there were plenty of laughs and good humour at the launch. Of particular note was a Southern Scribe husband's basterdised rendition of Paterson's 'Geebung Polo Club'. Highly entertaining!

Thanks you for inviting me to be a part of it all last night and I look forward to returning to entertain the Hopetoun community next year.

The Wee or Not the Wee.....

What is this? Is it a plastic water bottle filled with urine? I did wonder when I extricated it from the bowels of the back of Will's cupboard. No....I am not fossicking around in there looking for 'stuff'. I am ripping out all the carpet in the bedrooms as we having new carpet after twenty two years. Yay!

We do not have a 'little man' to do the ripping up and furniture removing in preparation for the carpet layers. I am it. All the muscled, useful types are out in the fields swathing the canola. But I digress......

"What is this?" I said to Dad, shaking the vile looking liquid in the bottle. The only good thing to be said about it was that it wasn't tepid....

"Sniff it" he said, looking slightly nervous, and obviously not keen to do the 'nose test' himself.

"Sniff it yourself" I replied.

But being the brave bush woman that I am I did the deed and announced, "It smells like alcohol."

Suddenly, quite keen to sniff the liquid, my 'hunka spunk' agreed. "Smells like scotch."

We rang 'the son and heir' at boarding school in Perth and questioned him as to the contents of his water bottle.

"Scotch and vodka" he said, outrightly and unashamedly (has learnt that lying is a worse crime than the crime itself)

"Gleaned from the drinks cupboards of the parents of your day boy friends?" I asked

"Yes" he replied, obviously amazed at my visionary powers (Hello? I was young once too....)

"Would I be right in presuming you have yet to work over ours?"

"Yup" he said.......

Tip: Turn every bottle of grog in your drinks cabinet upside down before you mark a line on what's in the bottle. Brilliant! The youth of today can't work it out as the line doesn't match up with the level of booze in the bottle when they are trying to filch it.

Reminder to self: Stop slugging intermittently from the bottle or the above ploy doesn't work.

Esperance Bush Poets' Breakfast

We have just had the inaugural Bush Poets' Breakfast at Esperance this month and it was a huge success with over 150 people turning up to hear the poets perform.

Here is WA Bush Poets and Yarn Spinners President, Brian Langley, performing to the very enthusiastic crowd. Other poets entertaining the masses were Bill Gordon from Boyup Brook, Victor Dale from Kalgoorlie and myself. Unfortunatley Peter Blyth from Albany (formerly of BuggerUp Downs, Salmon Gums) couldn't make it as he had 'buggered up' his back.

Brian's wife Dot started off the 'walk ups' for us, encouraging any would be poets to get up on stage and have a go at reading or reciting either their work or someone else's. After Dot had performed her piece, local writer Lesley Higson took to the stage and read two of her poems which were very well received. This bodes well for future bush poets' performances in the district. Hopefully we might run a Poets in the Park event next spring.

The morning was so much fun and so well attended that the Esperance Ag Society committee have decided to run it again next year.....so would be poets, get your pens onto paper or start learning your favourite piece for next year.

Swathing canola and crows

I climbed up on the roof of the house to take this shot across the home paddock a couple of weeks ago, with a view of the canola in flower and Mt Ney in the background. That beautiful yellow mass is no longer there, as the canola has nearly finished flowering, and swathing it will be the next job here on the farm.

In the meantime I am off to Pingrup this weekend for a Bush Poets' Dinner and fundraiser for the Royal Flying Doctor Service. This was a great gig last year, and I am looking forward to meeting up with fellow bush poets and hearing their contributions to the evening.

I am in the throes of writing some new poems as well as trying to kill a crow that keeps invading my chook house and stealing eggs. We've had three attempts at shooting it, none of them successful. Crows have ears and eyes in the backs of their heads. Everytime Tom tries to sneak round the side of the house to take a pot shot at it first thing in the morning (e.g. 5.30am) it spies him and takes off.

It is probably not helped by the fact he has done nothing to camouflage himself and blend into the scenery. Naked, apart from ugg boots and a gun is enough to scare anyone away.....

Celebrity Dog Obedience Competition

This is Dodger looking the epitome of virtue and good behaviour after a hard day's work on the farm.

Not so good today were some of the ABC Radio Celebrity Dog Obedience entrants at this year's Perth Royal Show.

Listeners of ABC Radio and spectators at the show were entertained with an extraordinary exhibition of behaviour from the celebrity pooches and their owners as they attempted to wend their way through the tasks set by the judges.

There was Breakfast presenter Eoin Cameron with his 'star struck psycho spaniel' Taj, claiming he was, quote "a little disappointed" with his canine companion's performance, citing "performance anxiety" ( referring maybe to the pair of them and not just his pooch). Taking the competition very seriously was Mornings presenter Geoff Hutchison and his mutt Milo, but the crowd pleaser was Drive's Russell Woolf, who unashamedly worked the crowd at every opportunity to give his dog Banjo the best advantage, resorting to good old fashioned bribery by dropping the judges off a bowl of his hand made rum balls before the competition had even started.

Dogs who didn't want to walk the plank were dragged along it. Dogs who were height challenged were lifted up to eat the sausage suspended from the string, and dogs who refused to jump through rings or run through tunnels were tossed through like cabers by their owners in an attempt to claim first prize.

I'll be talking to Cammo on his show tomorrow morning and performing 'Simmo's Last Laugh', a poem about a very naughty working dog who took off in his owner's ute and drove it into a salt lake. The poem was inspired by the true story of London Capitol Radio DJ Johnny Vaughan, whose dog drove his Maserati into the back of a rubbish skip!

Taj maybe able to open a fridge and help himself to the contents of the third shelf, but can he drive a ute? I doubt it.....

Review of Bronwyn Parry's "Dark Country"

If you enjoyed Fleur McDonald's "Red Dust" then add Bronwyn Parry's "Dark Country" to your list of books to read in the near future.

When the police vehicle she is driving breaks down one night on a quiet country road near Dungirri, New South Wales, local police sergeant Kris Matthews flags down a passing car. She gets a lift into town with Morgan 'Gil' Gillespie, a man who appears somewhat guarded and secretive, but does not seem out to harm her. What she doesn't know is that the residents of Dungirri have branded this man a murderer for the last eighteen years, and are in no mood to welcome him home to the small country community.

Things take a turn for the worse when the body of a dead woman is pulled from Gillepsie's car boot the following morning. However, one thing Kris Matthews is certain of is that Gillespie is not the murderer. Why? Because the body wasn't in the boot the previous night when they drove into town, and Gillespie has the best alibi a man could want.....Sergeant Kris Matthews herself.

So begins a fast paced novel of crime and romance as Kris and Gil embark on a journey to discover who the murderer is. This novel is packed with action, organised crime, and police corruption as the reader is drawn through an intriguing unravelling of Gillespie's past and his ties to this small country town.

Set in a dramatic Australian landscape, "Dark Country" is one of those books you hope to read on a wet weekend, curled up on the sofa, whilst disappearing into its pages for a ripping read of thrills and spills. Pure, unadulterated entertainment of the 'popular fiction' genre. Long may it live!

Be prepared for bodies walled up in deserted farm houses, bodies pressed up against one another in unbridled passion and bodies of evidence all hurtling towards a dramatic climax.

Just the book I was looking for after Christos Tsiolkas's "The Slap."

Also by Bronwyn Parry "As Darkness Falls." Visit www.bronwynparry.com

Review of The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas

This book is a 'must read'.

I did not pick it up because it was short listed for the 2009 Miles Franklin Literary Award, or because it was winner of the 2009 Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Overall Best Book. I picked it up after hearing a review of 'The Slap' on ABC Radio, and the subject matter intrigued me.

At a suburban barbecue in Melbourne, a man slaps a small boy who is not his own. This action has an immediate effect on those gathered in the back yard that 'lush late-summer afternoon'. It not only shuts down the barbecue immediately, but sends shock waves and reverberations through the group of family and friends who are present and who are either directly or indirectly affected and influenced by the slap.

The novel is told through the eyes and points of view of eight of the guests present at the barbecue. Using this form Tsiolkas has written a most thought provoking and disturbing comment on a modern twenty first century mixed ethnic group of family and friends living, loving, loathing and lusting in modern Australian suburban society.

I have to say that when I put the book down I thought "What a horrible group of people. I hope I never have to meet or associate with any of them." With the exception of the two teenage characters Connie and Richie; Aisha, the hostess that fateful afternoon; and Anouk, I wanted to get up and slap everyone else who stood up and gave their view point on the event.

The person I wanted to slap the most was the damned child! Spoilt, indulged, demanding and totally undisciplined I was fighting the urge to slap the little bastard myself. But had I been at the barbecue would I have slapped him, a child that was not my own, even if he was threatening to belt my child with a cricket bat? Definitley not, but then neither would I have associated with either of his ghastly parents.

This book will get you asking yourself many questions about how families of mixed ethnic origins manage to balance their beliefs, desires, dreams, traditions and expectations of one another and still manage to live together. Tsiolkas gives the reader a jaw dropping vision of a sector of the Australian middle class, and I wouldn't want to be living in it I can tell you.

The language is coarse, the sex is frenetic, the pace is suberb. A novel about loyalties, the nature of happiness and the compromises one has to make in order to attain that happiness.

After you've finished it, might I suggest you ring a friend who has also read 'The Slap' and enjoy a good dissection of the novel over a coffee or a glass of wine.

Oh, and read something light afterwards.......