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Robin Miller, fondly known as ‘The Sugarbird Lady’ was a pioneering aviator, humanitarian, and trailblazer for women. Had she not died so young, this week would mark her eighty-fourth birthday. Researching and writing a book based on Robin’s life has been an honour. Soaring with the Sugarbird Lady, published by Fremantle Press, comes out in March 2025
Robin packed so much living into thirty-five years. The daughter of author Mary Durack and aviator Horrie Miller, Robin grew up around aircraft. She overcame discrimination to become a pilot in the 1960s and saved hundreds of lives by flying to remote communities, where she administered 37,000 doses of the Sabin polio vaccine. Robin seemed to drop out of the vast blue sky in her Mooney aircraft, and as the vaccine was delivered via a sugar cube, she soon became known as ‘The Sugarbird Lady’.
After winging through aviation ‘glass ceilings’ in a miniskirt and bouffant hairdo, Robin became a pilot with the Royal Flying Doctor Service. She flew at all hours to help sick and injured patients. When a pregnant woman went into labour mid-flight, Robin put the plane onto autopilot, delivered the baby, and landed safely with one extra passenger.
Robin also ferried RFDS aircraft from Europe and America to Western Australia. You can see one of these, a single-engine FOCLI aircraft, and her dad’s Wackett at the Bull Creek Aviation Heritage Museum, where Soaring with the Sugarbird Lady will be launched by Professor Fiona Stanley, AC.
Fifty years after Robin’s death, this brave aviator remains a role model for all those with an adventurous spirit. I hope you will join me at the launch on March 5th 2025. Details here.
This is such an exciting and magical Book Week year for me with my book Scout and the Rescue Dogs being shortlisted for the CBCA Younger Readers Book of the Year as well as being shortlisted for WAYBRA and winning the WA Premier’s Awards.
Seeing this title, which is so close to my heart, showcased in schools, libraries, and bookshops across Australia is an honour, and I’m hoping to see some students dress up as Scout for Book Week Parades. Making a Scout costume is easy. All you need is:
If you’d like to add more details, you could wear a truckie t-shirt and carry a map of Victoria/southern NSW.
During Book Week/Month I’ll be visiting schools and bookshops across Victoria. Check out this link to see where I’ll be.
More Book Week costume ideas soon…
It’s been a very long while between blog posts, apologies!
The good news is that I’ve been busy writing and have some exciting projects in the pipeline. More about those soon.
In the meantime, I’m thrilled to share that Scout and the Rescue Dogs has been honoured with a Children’s Book Council of Australia shortlisting. For those not working in KidLit, it’s a huge and wonderful thing.
In the buildup to Children’s Book Week, schools across Australia make amazing library displays that will include Scout. Young ‘shadow judges‘ will discuss the stories, choose their own winners, and do fun activities based on each book.
But that’s not all… Scout and the Rescue Dogs has also been shortlisted for the West Australian Young Readers’ Book Awards. And, one of my favourites, Granny Grommet and Me, is back.
Fremantle Press has brightened the cover and published this story about surfing grannies in a smaller format that’s perfect for small hands. Since it was last in print, there are dozens more Granny Grommets braving the surf in Kinjarling Albany, and dozens more young grommets as well. Check out some of the clips and photos of the real GGs on this page.
Between all this excitement, I’ve been writing and editing, and early next year, I’ll have three new titles coming out. Two picture books, each with an amazing illustrator, and a biography/novel about an inspirational Australian. I’ll be posting about them soon.
In other news, I’ve jumped on board Shepherd, a great site where authors recommend five books linked to a topic. My first list is called The Best Books with an Important Octopus Character. It’s inspired, of course, by the octopus characters in my novel The Shark Caller. One is a giant gatekeeper, and the other is Izzy’s frightening adversary. Browsing Shepherd is addictive, in that one link leads to another and another and another … I’ve added so many titles to my reading stack!
Well, back to the editing for me. My next post will focus on Anzac books and activities. All the best for now.
Virtual apples for all the amazing educators heading back to schools after a well-earned break. Thanks in advance for all you do to inspire a love of books and stories in our children. Over at my Animals Who Talk website, there are some Back-to-School book title suggestions.
Image: Woolworths 🙂
Today I updated the Talks and Workshops tab on my website, ready for the year ahead. If you have time, take a peek at the fresh blurbs and session ideas. I’m also regularly updating the Events tab, so hope to see you somewhere on my 2023 book travels …
After a huge year in 2022, with three new books in three different genres with three different publishers, I’m currently catching my breath before the publication of my middle-grade novel, Scout and the Rescue Dogs in a few months.
In the meantime, I’m beyond excited about the forthcoming Theatre 180 CineStage adaptation, The Lighthouse Girl Saga. It’s based on the four books in my ‘Light’ series with Fremantle Press. The show opens in Albany on February 23rd before heading to Busselton and other parts of WA. More about that soon. Fingers crossed that the show will also travel to eastern Australia.
After some unexpected delays, Skye Blackburn-Land: eating bugs for the planet is here!
Skye always wanted to be an entomologist. Her unusual childhood pets included ‘Fluffy’ the tarantula and ‘Woodstock’ a giant burrowing roach that blows kisses and has starred in video clips.
She followed her dream and studied bug science as well as food science. Now, as Australia’s first farmer of edible insects, and a future foods pioneer, Skye and her trailblazing team, teach people that insects are an eco-friendly, and delicious, food alternative.
Most of all, Skye loves inspiring the next generation to follow their passion to achieve their career dreams.
The Aussie STEM Stars series celebrates Australia’s leaders in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. To celebrate the new release, Skye’s online shop, Circle Harvest, is offering a book and edible bugs bundle. I’ve tried all the delicious products in the pack except one …
It’s 80 years since the horrific WWII battles along Papua New Guinea’s Kokoda Track. In 2002 I hiked the track to research a YA novel (yet to be published). An unexpected outcome of the trip was the publication of my first picture book, Photographs in the Mud. It’s 17 years since Fremantle Press published this story, told from both Australian and Japanese perspectives. It has also been published in Japanese.
In the latest edition of ‘The Open Book,’ you can read more about this book’s journey. I’m grateful to Fremantle Press for keeping this title in print for 17 years!
More details here and via other blogposts on my website.
Dogs and Reading are two things I love. The fantastic Story Dogs program combines both. Story Dogs help young readers at risk. Their mission is: To make reading fun for children, so they become confident lifelong readers. When children read to a dog, the outcomes are amazing! How wonderful that the non-judgemental nature of dogs can help make this magic happen.
The Story Dogs’ mantra that No child should be left behind in literacy has always resonated deeply with me. I’ve wanted to sign up with Harry for years, but volunteers need to turn up every week. Even in Covid times, I travel a lot for work, so I’m excited to announce that I am now the proud sponsor of … Buttercup and Sally.
Sally and beautiful Buttercup will be visiting the Year Two class at Parklands School in Albany every Tuesday. Part of the sponsorship funds Buttercup’s bright orange jacket and I was invited to forward a logo. I didn’t have a logo, so have adapted an image from my other website, Animals who Talk. Seeing it on Buttercup as she moved between young readers last week was the most wonderful feeling.
Story Dogs say that when children read in a non-judgemental setting, the children’s focus improves, their literacy skills increase and their confidence soars. The accepting, loving nature of dogs gives this program its magic and helps children relax, open up, try harder and have fun while reading to a friendly, calm dog.
I’m so proud to be a Story Dogs sponsor. Maybe you’d like to get involved as well …
Thank you Jen McRae, Kathryn Le Gay Brereton, Joanna Thiel, Sally Thomas, Carly Talbot, and Buttercup for your wonderful facilitating.
Today is World Animal Day, a good opportunity to share a sneak peek of my new book. I’ve just received an advance copy of The Last Light Horse due for release March 2022.
More details can be found on my other website Animals who Talk. In a few weeks I’ll be posting further images and details about Sandy’s backstory…
Today we farewell Don Watson, the son of Lighthouse Girl, Fay.
Don will be sadly missed. He and his family have been part of my ‘Light series’ writing journey from the beginning and we have shared many wonderful moments since.
In 2005, after reading a newspaper article written by Ron Crittall about WWI troops gathering in Albany in 1914, I became curious about Fay Howe, the Breaksea Island lighthouse keeper’s daughter. A paragraph in the article mentioned Fay relaying final messages for the soldiers, then later receiving postcards from them thanking her. They were addressed to, ‘The little girl on Breaksea Island’.
I wanted to find out more. The article mentioned ‘Perth man, Don Watson’ so I began searching phone listings. After several wary replies to my question, ‘Are you related to a Breaksea Island lighthouse keeper?’, eventually I found the right D. Watson. Don and his lovely wife, Peg, invited me to lunch and so began our friendship and shared Lighthouse Girl journey.
Although the WWI postcards have been lost to history, Fay’s son, Don, remembered reading those beautiful embroidered postcards as a child and was able to tell me about the messages. Since then we have seen Fay become a giant.
And her story has also been adapted for stage, commemorated in song, gifted to a Prime Minister, inspired a TV documentary and two US podcasts, as well as countless library displays, school shows and Book Week costumes.
Research for Lighthouse Girl then led to linked titles; Light Horse Boy, In the Lamplight and soon to be published (March 2022) The Last Light Horse. More information about Fay and these events can be found in previous blog posts: Fay’s Life, Book to Play, Giants, More Giants, even more Giants and the very last Giants.
Fay’s son was a generous, family-oriented man who volunteered with many organisations. Knowing Don and his extended family has been a great honour. May he now rest in peace with Fay and all those long ago soldiers.
Dear Lockdowners, many authors have free activities, book-trailers, and fun information on their websites, along with teaching notes and downloadables. Earlier this year the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators WA (SCBWI) compiled a resources page that will keep you busy for hours.
Author, Nadia King‘s lovely Pippa likes to dress up as the flying doctor.
There are activity links on my website for all ages; turn a button on a page into a monster, or rocket or eye of a shark. Draw patterns on snail shells, or make snail cutouts into pop stick puppets. Find out about WW1 nurses and Spanish Influenza, or wartime animal mascots, here or at the Australian War Memorial. Write a postcard home from the war or listen to two podcasts about lighthouse girl, Fay’s life. Check out the great links on this Aussie STEM Stars site. Dress up your dog with seven different names, and send me a photo 😉 Explore anthropomorphism on my Animals Who Talk website or draw someone with a marsupial in their bra!
And there’s more … Earlier this year, the team from CBCA WA created library holiday presentations, and for a limited time, they will all be online. There are eight sessions by WA creatives for different age groups. Here’s mine and here are the short introductions to all eight. I hope you enjoy them and fingers crossed for a short lockdown…
Lighthouse Girl continues her journey into other formats. This time Fay’s story is celebrated in a two-part podcast on Light Hearted, the podcast channel of the United States Lighthouse Society. It was an honour chatting with host Jeremy D’Entremont and lovely that the second podcast features Don Watson, the son of Fay, and his family.
This interview has led me to network with worldwide groups of lighthouse aficionados, all passionate about preserving lighthouse histories and also passionate about sharing fascinating stories about individual keepers. The lights shine on.
2020 was challenging. Plans to post regularly on my new Animals Who Talk website fell into a heap. But onwards bravely… and now I’m excited to share my 2021 plans.
While this blog space remains for general posts, over on the other site, on the 1st and 3rd Tuesdays of each month, I’ll be sharing books that are anthropomorphic or that feature interesting animal characters. 1st Tuesday posts will be for adult books. 3rd Tuesdays for children’s titles.
There is even a new post over there now, with more details. Wishing you and yours a wonderful 2021.
The Dog with Seven Names is now available in Chinese with publisher UTOP – available from: dangdang, JD.com , tmall,.
I am so pleased that this translation was able to go ahead during this challenging time, and hope that many new readers will enjoy the story of a small dog in north-western Australia during WWII.
Thank you, Min Zha for your translation. I wish I could speak/read Chinese so that I could enjoy your words! Thank you also Zhuang Yuan for editing and steering little dog on her exciting new adventure. I love the cute cover image (full jacket below) and feel sure that Princess, Elsie, and all the other characters would too.
Attention all emerging scientists…
The team at Wild Dingo Press has been busy creating a wonderful website dedicated to the new Aussie STEM Star series. It’s designed for young readers and adults with information about each book, clips, and interviews with the authors and of course details about the inspirational STEM Stars themselves. Check it out here.
Who remembers a favourite teacher or librarian?
Often we don’t realise how important an educator has been in our life until years later. Today is International Literacy Day and I’d like to give a special shout-out to Colleen and her fabulous library team at Bunbury Catholic College. Not only do they create amazing displays that inspire young readers and make visiting authors feel like celebrities… they also support less fortunate students. BCC staff and students recently raised $450 to support Room to Read, an organisation that helps support worldwide reading and literacy. Congratulation Bunbury Catholic College for modeling kindness during this challenging time.
When I was little I loved jigsaws. I was good at Maths until Year 5. Then we moved overseas and I missed a few important things, like short division. When we returned I was in high school. My new teacher was a brilliant mathematician but couldn’t fathom my inability to get things the first time (I’d been put in the top maths class). It wasn’t until long after leaving school that I learned there was an actual purpose to memorising algebraic formula, things like sine and cosine were used in the real world!
Biology was way more interesting to me. Who remembers The Web of Life textbook? I loved that book. It was a brick and I carried it one and a half kilometres to and from school for years. The Web of Life was full of interesting charts and images that related to the world around me. I loved the title too.
Image: http://www.amandacurtin.com
Last week was National Science Week and each morning I’d hoped to receive the first ten copies of my new book, Munjed Al Muderis – from refugee to surgical inventor. Today they arrived at last. They look great and so for me, the fun of National Science Week continues …
Munjed’s story is part of the Aussie STEM Stars series, celebrating Australian experts in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. His work has made Australia a world-leader in osseointegration. Unlike me, Munjed excels in both biology and algebra! Being part of the Aussie STEM Stars series has helped me reassess the importance of STEM subjects (even maths). I’ve loved reading about Georgia Fear Ware‘s fascinating work with reptiles and cane toads as well as learning more about amazing Fiona Wood. I hope readers of all ages will enjoy this terrific new series.
Today is Victory in the Pacific Day, commemorating the end of WWII 75 years ago.
My first picture book, Photographs in the Mud is set in PNG in 1942. It was inspired by an old tree stump and a true story I heard whilst hiking the Kokoda Track in 2002. Photographs in the Mud follows two fictitious soldiers into battle; one Australian and one Japanese. Jack and Hoshi meet in battle on Mission Ridge, the site of ferocious WWII combat. The men slide down the mountain away from the fighting, lying together in a ditch. Away from the horror, they share a moment of common humanity.
In real life, the surviving soldier never forgets the eyes of the other man, and today on VP Day, I’m remembering these two men from opposing armies who found a moment of peace in a jungle far from home.
Photographs in the Mud was inspired by this true story. It was published in 2005 and has been in print continuously for the past 15 years. After Lighthouse Girl, it’s the most ‘clicked on’ title on my website and I’m delighted to still find Photographs in the Mud in school libraries across Australia. This little picture book was shortlisted for several awards and published in Japanese as, “Nimai No Shashin” (Two Photographs). Photographs in the Mud was also used as an international peace reference and became the subject of a paper published by Professor Jim Martin (Sydney Uni) focusing on ‘Genre, ideology and intertextuality’. In 2009, Kokichi Nishimura‘s full life story, The Bone Man of Kokoda was published by Charles Happell.
After all the hard work that goes into the creation of a book, it’s wonderful for an author (and illustrator, Brian Harrison-Lever) when a title stays in print for so long. Thank you Fremantle Press for keeping this story of hope and common humanity alive.
More photographs of my ten-day Kokoda trek and teaching notes can be found here. Lest we Forget.
Refugees bring wisdom, skills and fresh perspectives to our ‘Lucky Country’.
Saturday June 20th is World Refugee Day. For the past eight months I’ve been researching the life of Dr Munjed Al Muderis, the world-renowned surgeon whose fascination for robotics, his dedication and glass-half-full attitude has led Australia to become the world leader for pioneering osseointegration surgery. Munjed Al Muderis – From refugee to surgical inventor will be published by Wild Dingo Press on September 1st 2020. A sneak cover peek is below.
According to the United Nations 1951 Refugee Convention, a refugee is someone who fled his or her home and country owing to “a well-founded fear of persecution because of his/her race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion”.
After refusing to mutilate the ears of army deserters in Iraq, Munjed fled for his life with one possession, the medical book Last’s Anatomy. He survived an horrendous voyage in a rickety, overcrowded boat, arrived at Christmas Island and was taken to Curtin Detention Centre in north-western Australia. There he suffered ten months of bullying, false accusations and indignities. But Munjed never gave up. He always wanted to make a difference, to help those less fortunate.
Osseintegration is a revolutionary surgical procedure whereby a metal stem is implanted into the bone of a patient’s remaining limb. The stem then connects to a robotic prosthesis, allowing improved sensory experience, greater movement and less pain. The surgery is life-changing for patients. Munjed’s interest in robotics was sparked long ago when he was a child watching Arnie Schwarzenegger as “The terminator“.
Munjed Al Muderis – From refugee to surgical inventor explores Munjed’s journey to Australia and other life-shaping moments from his early years. This book is the third title in the Aussie STEM Stars series. The first three books will be released together. In Book 1 Cristy Burne explores the life of Fiona Wood AM. In Book 2 Claire Saxby explores the life of Dr Georgia Ward-Fear.
Munjed’s skill and compassion has changed the lives of thousands of people across the world. He’s a powerful advocate for Amnesty International, the Red Cross and asylum seekers. Munjed is the current NSW Australian of the Year and has received many other accolades. This inspirational surgeon and humanitarian is one of many refugees who have enriched Australia. On this World Refugee Day let’s all take a moment to acknowledge these contributions and to remember the importance of kindness.
After the horror and devastation of the bush fires human kindness emerges. From lemonade stands to celebrity donations, people across Australia and the world are opening their hearts, homes and wallets. Thinking about the lost lives, habitat and wildlife is overwhelming so for now I’m trying to focus on kindness and ways to help.
One inspirational campaign is the twitter auction #AuthorsForFireys. Started by authors Emily Gale and Nova Weetman the auction ends at 11 pm tonight EST. The opportunities being offered are wide-reaching. You can buy original artworks, signed books, have an author name a human or even wombat character after you (Jackie French), bid for an author visit to your school or book group, have authors cook for you … All funds raised go directly to an Australian state fire service.
My donation is a stack of signed books and a cake/coffee meeting or postage. I joined Twitter to take part and so am still learning how it all works. Thanks to the current top bidder Peter Williams with a generous $250. Thank you also to Melinda Tognini, Heather Delfs, Louise Brooks, Julie Woodland, Felix from website designers Social Force, Audrey Davidson and Tamara Moss for kicking off the bids. More details: https://twitter.com/diannewolfer/status/1214347769713790977 or the website is here. Please dig deep to help our fire fighters.
Dianne Wolfer 