Kathryn's Inbox

This short eBook had me asking one vital question as I got to the last page-- when will I get to read part two. Ever-so-slightly reminiscent of Mad Max, this is the story of Elizabeth, a young woman who is living with her family in a bleak, future version of Australia where resources, particularly food and water, are scarce. Elizabeth is one heck of a tough young woman who is fighting to feed her family. This is a solid introduction to what absolutely has the potential to be a killer series.  Highly recommended. 

Stephenie Meyer's talent lies in her ability to write a page-turner that appeals most to readers who are not fans of the genre. Twilight , for example is not a classic horror novel, though it soon became phenomenally popular with teenage girls and any adult reader who, though they could see the many failings within the narrative, enjoyed the series anyway. The Host  presented a taste of science fiction, one that contained more than a dash of romance. And with her latest novel, The Chemist the author pens a sci-fi thriller about an ex-government agent who is on the run from the very department that employed her in the first place. Juliana was a chemist who was employed by a top secret government agency (one so top secret that it doesn't have a name,) developing concoctions that helped torture some of the CIAs most wanted criminals. The department became infected by paranoia, and after her colleagues try to kill her, Juliana goes on the run, living under a number of alias...

Snapped this strange little thing outside the Art Gallery of South Australia a few months back. It was there to advertise an exhibition, the name of which escapes me for the moment ...

This one is 1980s Nostalgia, sort of. I don't remember this episode of Edward and Friends at all. A little wet, but entertaining ...

Looks remarkably like my house ...

Beside Myself is a literary thriller that had a lot of tongues wagging when it was released several months ago and it's not difficult to see why--the premise is utterly intriguing. Six year old identical twins, Helen and Ellie agree to swap places just for one day. But when Ellie refuses to swap back, the course of Helen's life is changed forever. While she watches her twin live a happy life, her own is filled with illness and addiction, and no one will believe her claims that she is Helen and not Ellie ... This novel is complex and intriguing. It's also dark as hell and depressing. And, language warning everyone (and my sincere apologies to the author and publisher,) but that twist at the end is utterly fucked. Or brilliant if you look at it through the perspective of the complexities of human nature and ego. (Or the unwillingness of some people to admit they were wrong, and had been hoodwinked by a six year old, to the point where they were willing to cause signi...

Sometimes cute, sometimes crude, sometimes thought provoking and nearly always hilarious Something to Say provides readers with a slice of truth, deliciously served inside a very beautiful, and very quirky, book. Something to Say is Frankie Magazine's very first book and it contains stories that have appeared inside the magazine during its twelve year run. (Meaning that I've probably read a number of them before, but hey, these are definitely worth a second read.) The book itself is presented beautifully, on notebook style paper, that sometimes feels like a bit of a contrast to some of the crude and sweary articles, but that makes it kind of cool. There are lots of reflections on life, and those odd things that happen to all of us--one author reflects on how a trip to the service station in the middle of the night led to being pelted with a pie and then an escape with a couple of Kinder Surprises in hand. There is commentary on family, fashion (or family and fashion, as on...

A repeat this week, but I love the way that this tree blends in perfectly with the mural behind it. This picture was taken on the corner of Hunt Crescent and Beach Road at Christies Beach. The building is home to a shop that specialises in reptiles and reptile care ...

Perhaps the greatest Australian ad ever made?

Sometime between his stint of being a maniac who advertised Wilkin's Coffee and being the straight man, or should we say, frog, at Muppet Theatre, Kermit the Frog was staring in Sesame Street where he was part of a near perfect comic duo. Cast opposite Grover, who played the part of an incompetent salesperson, Kermit found himself subject to numerous sales pitches that nearly always ended in disaster. In this one, Kermit gets his sweet revenge ...

Welcome to my new semi-regular post, Random Trivia About ... which contains well, random trivia about one of my books. This time around I'm going to be focusing on Behind the Scenes, my third novel, which I re-released with a new cover last year. 1. Catlin's full name is Catherine Theresa Ryan. Catlin is a nickname given to her by her mother, as she was unable to pronounce Catherine properly. 2. Catlin's birthday is 9 June 1989. The novel opens shortly before her eighteenth birthday. If you do the maths, this means that novel is set in 2007. (Or if you want further confirmation, Johnny's headstone lists his death date as 13 June 2007.)  3. The first part of the novel is set in Southcoast, a fictional town south of Adelaide. Another of my novels, Best Forgotten , is set in the same location. 4. Catlin's address in Melbourne is 10 Baird Avenue, St Kilda. St Kilda is a real suburb, the street is fictitious. I named street after the in...

Sometimes, it's just fun to read a bit of fun, fluffy middle grade fiction. Particularly when it is the kind that would have had me practically weeing myself with excitement at age thirteen. I loved the concept of this new series and for that reason, I just had to read the first instalment. The Right Track introduces us to Lark, a thirteen year old who is brutally shy, and who has a talent for songwriting--a talent that she does not wish to share with her mother, Donna, an LA based record company executive. Then a new problem arises, in the form of a three member boy band from the UK, who are going to stay with Donna and Lark while they record their first album. How will Lark manage to live with three hot boys and keep her songwriting talent a secret? This one was sweet and pure fun. Certainly there were a few cliches (including the name of the author, a probable pseudonym,) but these were all handled well. A few moments had me smiling, such as Lark fainting at the airport,...

Well, that's one way to decorate ...

On select Sundays I will be reviewing some of the old Apple Paperback titles from my childhood. These titles were published, or republished by Scholastic during the 1980s & 1990s and were written and set in the United States. In Australia, these books were typically only available from libraries or could be ordered through catalogues that were distributed through primary schools, though some popular series found their way into various bookshops. Most of these titles are now long out of print or have been updated and republished for later generations ... I have very clear memories of reading this book when I was a kid--I remember when it came out, our school library got a copy in almost straight away and I was the first kid in the whole school to borrow it. It was the first time I had ever been allowed such a privilege. Proudly, I took the book home that night and read it in one sitting   all by myself. Consequently, I thought that it was the best book ever. (Stop rolli...

Just wanted to share this clip from the short lived but lovely Edward and Friends television series that was based on Lego's Fabuland theme. I don't know how many times I saw this particular episode as a child, but I surprised myself when I started watching it on YouTube and realised that I could remember every word! On a less innocent note, I can remember making up a dirty version of this as a teenager, where the fuzzy thing in every picture was not Edward's trunk, Hannah was a prostitute and where Wilfred Walrus kept blackmailing him for the cost of the film and ending up at the bottom of the canal wearing cement shoes when Edward's gangster older brother found out what was going on, but that's teenage fan fiction for you ...

The Girl From Venice may be the first book that I have ever read by best-selling author Martin Cruz Smith, but I am absolutely certain that it will not be the last. I was pleasantly surprised by just how caught up I became in this story of a fisherman who finds a young Jewish girl in Italy in the final days of World War Two. From there begins a fantastic story of two people who beat the odds, fall in love and find themselves in the midst of a nation in crisis. (After all, Italy has picked the losing side, none of it's people are happy about it, and it's dictator is no long a popular man.) The author cleverly shows the difference between the people and their government, and the uglier side of human nature, where everyone does what they can to survive with little thought to morality or personal accountability. (Excluding, of course, our lead characters--but that would not make for such an interesting story.) Cenzo is the middle of three brothers, and man with a grudge--h...

Beyond the Orchard is a beautiful story of love, loneliness, family and secrets, spanning the twentieth century. Lucy Briar left home in a hurry, keen to get away from a broken heart and past mistakes. Five years later, a mysterious letter from her distant grandfather, claiming that he wants to explain everything, arrives and Lucy finds herself leaving London, and her fiance for her hometown of Melbourne. Her grandfather, Edwin, passes away before she arrives. Her father, Ron, who is struggling with his own problems insists that she travels to Bitterwood, the old estate in country Victoria owned by her grandfather, to retrieve a photo album. What Lucy finds at Bitterwood leads her to uncovering another, much darker, family secret ... Of all of Anna Romer's novels, Beyond the Orchard is by far my favourite for its dark mystery and surprising conclusion. I loved reading the story of Orah and her tragic arrival in Australia that eventually brought her to Bitterwood, as well ...

This artwork appears at the front of an shop in James Place that specialises in imported confectionary, most of it from the United Kingdom, though I notice that in recent times, their range of imports from the United States has increased steadily. It is one of those places that I stop by "every now and again" and usually find myself buying a small selection of sherbet (from the UK side) and junior mints or almond M&Ms (from the US side.)

On select Sundays I will be reviewing some of the old Apple Paperback titles from my childhood. These titles were published, or republished by Scholastic during the 1980s & 1990s and were written and set in the United States. In Australia, these books were typically only available from libraries or could be ordered through catalogues that were distributed through primary schools, though some popular series found their way into various bookshops. Most of these titles are now long out of print or have been updated and republished for later generations ... I have a confession to make. I actually have no memory of this particular Babysitters Club title being released in Australia. Perhaps by the time it was released (1994) I had already outgrown or was beginning to outgrow the series. (I know it was definitely a distant memory for me when the Babysitters Club Movie eventually came out, but I think that was in 1995.) After all, it was the year that I actually turned thirteen and ...

Seems like pretty good advice to me.

Hello and welcome to my stop on the Beyond the Orchard blog tour. I am very, very excited to share this brilliant and insightful post that author Anna Romer has written about her latest novel, Beyond the Orchard. (In fact, it's been difficult for me keeping it under wraps these past few weeks.) Anyway, a very sincere thank you to Anna Romer and also her publisher Simon and Schuster Australia for putting together this brilliant post and the Beyond the Orchard Blog Tour ... Past and Present: How the Lives of One Generation Shape the Next in Anna Romer's Beyond the Orchard. When I first started collecting ideas for Beyond the Orchard , all I had was a location – a clifftop guesthouse along the great Ocean Road in Victoria – and the idea of someone guarding a terrible secret. But as the story began to unfold, I realised that the secret keeper, Edwin Briar, would cast his shadow over just about every other character in the novel. His actions would link the centr...