June GeoCAT: Australia and New Zealand

June GeoCAT: Australia and New Zealand



Australia:
Australia, officially known as the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area.

For about 50,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who spoke languages grouped into roughly 250 language groups. After the European discovery of the continent by Dutch explorers in 1606, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain in 1770 and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades; the continent was explored and an additional five self-governing crown colonies were established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Since federation, Australia has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy comprising six states and several territories. The population of 24 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated in the eastern states and on the coast.

(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia)



New Zealand:
New Zealand is an island nation in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses – that of the North Island, or Te Ika-a-Māui, and the South Island, or Te Waipounamu – and numerous smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 1,500 kilometres (900 mi) east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres (600 mi) south of the Pacific island areas of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. Because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans. During its long period of isolation, New Zealand developed a distinctive biodiversity of animal, fungal and plant life. The country's varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks, such as the Southern Alps, owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions. New Zealand's capital city is Wellington, while its most populous city is Auckland.

Somewhere between 1250 and 1300 CE, Polynesians settled in the islands that were to become New Zealand, and developed a distinctive Māori culture. In 1642, Abel Tasman, a Dutch explorer, became the first European to sight New Zealand. In 1840, representatives of the British Crown and Māori Chiefs signed the Treaty of Waitangi, making New Zealand a British colony. Today, the majority of New Zealand's population of 4.5 million is of European descent; the indigenous Māori are the largest minority, followed by Asians and Pacific Islanders. Reflecting this, New Zealand's culture is mainly derived from Māori and early British settlers, with recent broadening arising from increased immigration. The official languages are English, Māori and New Zealand Sign Language, with English predominant.

(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand)



Australian Literature:
Australian literature is the written or literary work produced in the area or by the people of the Commonwealth of Australia and its preceding colonies. During its early Western history, Australia was a collection of British colonies, therefore, its literary tradition begins with and is linked to the broader tradition of English literature. However, the narrative art of Australian writers has, since 1788, introduced the character of a new continent into literature—exploring such themes as Aboriginality, mateship, egalitarianism, democracy, national identity, migration, Australia's unique location and geography, the complexities of urban living and the "beauty and the terror" of life in the Australian bush.

Notable Australian writers have included the novelists Marcus Clarke, Miles Franklin, Christina Stead, Patrick White, David Malouf, Thomas Keneally, Morris West and Colleen McCullough, the bush poets Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson, historians Manning Clark and Geoffrey Blainey, the playwright David Williamson and leading expatriate writers Barry Humphries, Robert Hughes, Clive James and Germaine Greer.
There are also Australian works produced by writers (usually of migrant origin) in languages other than English.
(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_literature)



New Zealand literature:
New Zealand literature may be written by New Zealand-born writers, by immigrants, or by emigrants. It may deal with New Zealand themes or places, but some literature written by New Zealanders focusses on non-parochial themes and places. The concept of a "New Zealand literature" originated primarily in the 20th-century, inspired particularly by essays such as Bill Pearson's Fretful Sleepers — A Sketch of New Zealand Behaviour and its Implications for the Artist (1974). New Zealand literature is produced predominantly in the English language, and as such forms a sub-type of English literature. +

(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_literature)

Some possible options:
Australia:
In a Sunburned Country / Bill Bryson
Cloudstreet / Tim Winton
A Town Like Alice / Nevil Shute
The Light Between Oceans / M.L. Stedman

New Zealand:
Slipping into Paradise / Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson
The Bone People / Keri Hulme
Guardian of the Dead / Karen Healey
Died in the Wool / Nagio Marsh

And don't forget to update the wiki:
http://www.librarything.com/wiki/index.php/2016CC_GeoCAT#June

Here it is. I was going to take time to add more suggestions, but I just dont' have time at the moment. Lots of unpacking to do.

Also, my apologies for the image sizes. Yes, I have the html code in there that should resize them, but except for the first time or two I posted here with images, it hasn't worked for me since. I should have previewed this first, but I don't know how to fix it when the html code IS there!

I may just come back and remove them later, but I'll leave them for the moment.

Each of the images start with the open "carrot" bracket, then:
img width=”200” src="

Then the url for the image, then it closes with the quotation mark and the closed carrot bracket.

ETA: This info is in case anyone has any suggestions! I love adding the images, I just wish they wouldn't be so big. Maybe (tomorrow?) I'll look for some that just are smaller to begin with and don't need resizing.

Strangely enough I just picked up a guidebook to New Zealand at the library! I'm not planning to visit any time soon, mainly because I can't stand the thought of all that air travel, but it is nice to look at pretty pictures and read about all the neat places to see there :)

My actual GeoCAT selection will be No Highway, by Australian author Nevil Shute.

I am planning to read Two in the Bush by Gerald Durrell.

I've seen the movie, Whale Rider, but never read the book by Witi Ihimaera. I think I will now.

Edited to add movie poster

I have a few in mind for next months GeoCat - Dunger by Joy Cowley, The Captive Wife by Fiona Kidman and Little Big Lies by Liane Moriarty.

I've requested a few volumes by Ngaio Marsh for June reading in this challenge.

I'm finally going to read The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton. I'm looking forward to a substantial, engrossing book while I prepare for my own move.

I have a few Australian books on the shelves. Will probably read Voss by Patrick White.

If anyone is looking for a crime novel, I recommend Garry Disher's Challis and Destry series, which starts with The Dragon Man.

Last Sunday, Christopher Clark the historian took us on a TV tour of Australia that made me wish I could climb a plane right then and there. He also quoted a poem known to probably all Australians by Dorothea Mackellar which can be found here http://www.dorotheamackellar.com.au/index.html, together with a few others. I've also got a few books lined up...

I like the images! Great maps!

I use <img src="image url"height=200>

Choose the height you like, the width ratio will remain correct.

I plan to read Sorry by Gail Jones that will also fit the BingoDog square "about an indigenous person".

I think I will read Lexicon by Australian author Max Barry.

>12 VivienneR: Thanks. On my tablet at the moment but when i get back to my pc, ill give it a try.

I'm planning to read:

Australia: True Stories of Life Down Under
Journal of Katherine Mansfield (New Zealand author)

>12 VivienneR: >14 LibraryCin: It worked!!!! I'll change the others, as well!

I hope to read Voss by Patrick White. Maybe a few Kerry Greenwood mysteries as well...

>16 LibraryCin: Great!

I think I'll be reading The Bone People.

I'm really trying to read books from Mt TBR for these challenges and the only other one I have tagged Australia is Elizabeth Costello. I never think of Coetzee as an Australian author, but I guess he does have citizenship there and the title character lives in Australia.

I don't think I posted, yet, what I'm hoping to read! I'll pick at least one of these:

Slipping Into Paradise / Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson
The Tin Ticket / Deborah J. Swiss
The Secret Keeper / Kate Morton

I've started Eve Langley's The Pea Pickers, which will take a while to read because it is dense, poetic and strange.

>11 MissWatson: We learned it at school: "I love a sunburned country....."

I've read quite a few good Aussie books this year, especially given that I have made a category just for them!. Here is a perfect excuse to read another one.

>7 DeltaQueen50:, Big Little Lies is one of my "book of the month" choices this year. I hope you have time to get to it Judy. I listened to the audiobook which was very well done.

>22 Roro8: I think I took a BB from you Ro for Big Little Lies, as I did get the audio version. I'm looking forward to it.

Jumping the gun a little - finished The Whale Rider. Beautiful little book! The author is Maori.

For those looking for another regional author, I remembered that Marcus Zusak (The Book Thief) is Australian.

Finished The Pea-pickers, a minor Australian classic. Memorable, but heavy-going in parts. Also planning to read Coonardoo by Katharine Susannah Prichard. Voss is on the back-burner for now.

>17 leslie.98: I forgot about the Phryne Fisher mysteries! After loving the TV series, I definitely want to read the books...might try to pick up Cocaine Blues this month.

>26 christina_reads: I think that I like her contemporary series featuring baker Corinna Chapman even better than the Miss Fisher one!

I'm almost all the way through The Getting of Wisdom, which takes place in Australia (mainly a ladies school in Melbourne).

I have completed Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty and The Lieutenant by Kate Grenville. I loved both these books.

I have just completed The Ship of Brides by Jojo Moyes. It is about four Australian war brides journeying to England on an aircraft carrier, along with 650 more Australian brides and the 1000 sailors and marines on board.

I've just finished The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty which takes place in Australia. I thoroughly enjoyed this one.

Just re-read One for the Road: Revised Edition , a story about hitchhiking around Australia.

I've started The Bone Tiki and it's good, but I'm in a movie-mood right now, so I'll be working on it a while longer.

>27 leslie.98: Didn't realize Kerry Greenwood had written non-Phryne Fisher books, so thanks for the tip! I just picked up Cocaine Blues from the library, and I'm excited to start it soon.

I am listening to the LibriVox recording of Fergus Hume's The Mystery of a Hansom Cab, which takes place in Melbourne (and fits this month's AlphaKIT)... and I have decided to reread Ngaio Marsh's Colour Scheme which takes place in her home country of New Zealand. I will have to get to Patrick White some other time...

I just finished Dunger by Joy Cowley which is a delightful YA book set in New Zealand.

I read the short story Springtime: A Ghost Story by Michelle De Kretzer, who is Sri Lankan but lives in Australia; the story is set in Sydney.

I started Lexicon by Australian author Max Barry.

Just finished Cocaine Blues (set in Melbourne, Australia, in the 1920s), which was great fun! I'll definitely continue with the Phryne Fisher series.

Sorry by Australian author Gail Jones was excellent. I gave it the full five stars!

I had aimed for something completely different, but number of pages and availability at the local library has been an issue. Plans changed, tonight I'll start The Broken Shore by Peter Temple.

I just finished The Bone Tiki which made me realize I know nothing about Maori mythology - so, more new stuff on the wishlist added... :)

I started and pearl ruled Carrion Colony. I hate books where you have to ask yourself every second sentence: Now what is that supposed to mean?!

I have started Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey. I haven't had great luck with Man Booker prize-winners but so far, so good...

I am reading Colour Scheme for this CAT. Set in New Zealand, by Ngaio Marsh, so I can use this for the Women Bingo Card (golden age of mystery author).

I've read two of Garry Disher's Wyatt novels: Paydirt and Kickback. Couldn't add them to the Wiki because I've been blocked. The block is supposed to expire soon, so I'll wait.

You do not have permission to edit this page, for the following reason:

Your IP address has been automatically blocked because it was used by another user, who was blocked by Lorannen. The reason given is:

Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Ionpenningsheld".
The reason given for Ionpenningsheld's block is "Spamming links to external sites"

Back to Disher. Lots of local Melbourne detail. Love it!

The Captive Wife by Fiona Kidman was an intriguing read and it covers both Australia and New Zealand during the time period of 1832 - 1842. Well written historical novel based on an actual event.

>11 MissWatson: The poem can also be found in The witch-maid and other verses which is available as an ebook at OpenLibrary.org. I love her way of using colours to describe the landscape, especially in "Bathing Rhyme" with its many greens. A truly wonderful discovery.

Starting Down Under by Bill Bryson

Buckley's Hope is a fictional account of William Buckley, a convict transported to Australia who escaped and lived in the bush with a band of aborigines for more than thirty years, until white settlers colonised what is now Melbourne.
This is an amazing story and should have been an interesting read, but I found it sadly unengaging. There is of course the problem that Buckley could read, but not write, and therefore left only his memoirs as taken down by someone else when he was old and his memory faulty. Robertson had to rely on other sources, most of which reflect the racist attitudes of the times and vilify Buckley. Still: the prose is simplistic and full of aborigine words as if to reflect their plain and simple lives, yet he lets Buckley reflect on his situation with modern sensibilities. The chapters about the return to white society and the heady development of the settlement feel rushed.
But the most off-putting thing are the typos, if they took the trouble to re-publish the book they should have taken the time to proof-read it. I cannot count how often b and h were transposed, how often I stumbled because wrong words had slipped in or because words or entire lines were missing. Nice try, shame about the execution.

COMPLETED Down Under by Bill Bryson.

My review:

Bill Bryson visits Australia, calling attention to how little it is known both to science and to the world at large.

As usual, he has produced a very, very funny travelogue, full of interesting, if rather random, anecdotes and facts, but it is Australia as perceived by a well-heeled tourist so I couldn't help but wonder what was being left out.

I just finished Wife on the Run, the story of a stressed out wife and mother who finally snaps after finding out her husband has been behaving inappropriately. She takes her two kids and her father on a road trip around Australia.

I read The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty. Not the book I intended for this month, but I needed an audiobook for a drive, and as it turned out, this one was set in Australia. Three husbands, three secrets, and their family’s lives intersect. Some tough issues covered, but I liked this one very much.

I finished my book for New Zealand, Colour Scheme by Ngaio Marsh, New Zealand author. Set in the thermal region of New Zealand, near a Maori reserve during WWII. Ngaio Marsh is one of the Queen's of Mystery. I've read three of the four queens, having Margery Allingham left. My book is a library copy and is from 1943. Surprised it is even on the shelf anymore with a back cover "This book, like all books, is a symbol of the liberty and the freedom for which we fight. You as a reader of books, can do your share in the desperate battle to protect those liberties--Buy War Bonds.

I don't understand why I can't put books into the Wiki. It says I've been blocked by someone by the name of Louanne. Does anyone know what this means. I've never done anything wrong.

>54 Kristelh: There have been some issues with the wiki lately. Nothing to do with you --an error was keeping most (all?) from posting. Wait a bit and try again.

ETA Here's the bug thread tracking the issue: http://www.librarything.com/topic/225674#5629688

>54 Kristelh: I had that happen a few days back. I contacted Lorannen (she's staff here) and she removed the block for me. Yes, apparently someone has been using people's IP addresses to spam the wikis somehow so many of us seemed to get caught in the crossfire.

ETA: Replied before I read sturlington's reply to you. Looks like that thread has a lot more info there!

I am reading Barracuda by Christos Tsiolkas. He also wrote The Slap.

And one more from Australian author Dorothea Mackellar: she co-wrote A little blue devil (no touchstone yet) with Ruth Bedford. The small son of an Englishwoman, who eloped with a French scoundrel and was disowned by her family, is abandoned by his father at the tender age of ten and has to fend for himself, which he does pretty much in the manner of Kipling's Kim. Kipling's poem also gives the title to the book, and the hero's journey takes him half around the world, touching most of the places Mackellar also celebrated in her poems. Nice.

I finished 2 more Australia books -- Oscar and Lucinda and Wings Above the Diamantina.

I ended up reading two books for June's challenge: Pastoral by Nevil Shute and The Persimmon Tree and Other Stories by Marjorie Barnard. Both authors are associated with Australia. Barnard is from there originally, while Shute immigrated after the Second World War (what can I say, I'm a cheater). I have to say I liked Shute's book better than Barnard's. There's just something about a good WWII pilot romance that works. Plus, my edition has the most amazing retro cover:



Who could say "no" to that?

I read the book I had planned to read for Australia and New Zealand - Two in the Bush by Gerald Durrell. It had bonus content about what was then Malaya. Durrell, his wife, and a couple of cameramen were filming a documentary about the conservation of endangered species in these countries. I Googled a few of the animals to see if conditions had improved in the last 50 years. Only one of the animals I checked had its conservation effort fail. Malaya's leathery turtle population is now extinct, but this turtle is still found in other parts of the world.

I'm a bit late with my update, but I did finish Vintage Murder, set in New Zealand, and by NZ author Ngaio Marsh.