Dim's Write Stuff

I’ve recently been examining the notion of friendship; what ignites it, how enduring it is, why it is simultaneously strong yet exquisitely fragile. Friendship cannot exist exclusively but is enriched with kindness and compassion, understanding and infinite patience. Friendship is, I guess, love. And love encompasses the best bits of friendship. This small handful of picture books encapsulates this notion in better ways than I could ever explain. I invite you to get better acquainted … Old Fellow Liz Anelli’s homely and divinely detailed drawings are the perfect accompaniment to Christopher Cheng’s touching tale about two old fellows; an affable elderly man and his furry black dog. They share their days together wondering the suburban streets of their neighbourhood and ambling through the local parks. Life around them is a riot of colour and action. They walk, muse, rest, and remember when they used to play ball and dash after birds. Now is more of a time of simply sitting and smelli...

The alluring title and intricate cover design of this novel provides instant grab but it’s the immediate saturation of raw authentic atmosphere that really pulls you into Salama’s story. Debut author Zoulfa Katouh pours her heart and soul into Salama but does so with enough measured restraint and humour to ensure this exposé of Syria’s present day atrocities appeals not only to adult readers but also its intended YA audience. And, it’s an allure that lingers all the way to the heart touching end. Salama is a young Syrian girl living in Homs, a city located on the Orontes River in western Syria. A city razed to the ground by Syria’s ugly ongoing Civil war. She lives amongst the destruction surviving on less than nothing, enduring nerves more frayed than the fabric of any remaining normality. Every ounce of energy is directed into maintaining the welfare of others, namely those brought into the local hospital in which she works to be cobbled back together again. She mends, stitches, s...

This beautiful illustrated middle grade fiction has all the qualities of a permanent place-keeper on one's bookshelf; kids with whom it resonates won’t be able to surrender it. By the creators who brought us Julia and the Shark, Leila and the Blue Fox , presents a balanced and bespoke narrative based on the real life crossing made by an Artic fox across the Artic circle. Fox, known in human circles as, Miso, is driven by her wild desire, to migrate. She knows not exactly where or how long such a journey will take her. Distance is inconsequential. Survival is her daily modus operandi. To keep on going is her sole motivation. Leila, a young Syrian refugee resides in London with her cousin and aunty. Life is relatively trouble free and wholesome, yet there is an artic circle sized hole within Leila that haunts her; the reason why her mother virtually abandoned her for the last six years. When Leila’s mother sends for Leila to join her in Tromsø, Norway, trepidation pollutes hope...

From the author who gave us the heart-jolting ,  Exit Through The Gift Shop , comes another show-stopping middle grade drama.  No Words  pulls no punches telling the story of 12-year-old refugee, Aria and moves with the same tumultuous pace as  Master’s  former novel. Don’t equate the tempo of this narrative with a rushed outcome however because Aria’s tale is told with measured sensitivity and precision. It just happens to be in the same voice as your typical upper primary school kid with as much energetic beat and bounce. Which is ironic when the story centres around Aria’s distinct  lack  of voice. Aria hails from old Iran, Persia having fled his country with his older brother and father. There was no time for goodbyes. No time to mourn the loss of his beloved mother. No time to digest the horror of their situation. We learn through the broken recall of Aria that his mother was persecuted for her liberated feminist beliefs. But that is not the main ...

I am Australia born. And bred. My accent is a batter of Queensland Aussie twang and transatlantic drawl (thanks to time spent residing in Europe and riding the high waves of superyacht crewing). I have the colouring of a Mauri and have been mistaken for a woman of Mauritian or Pacific Islander descent. I have the perverse wit of the Irish and the dark hair of a Romany Scots. Frugal as crazy rich Asian and just as superstitious, I am all of these things and none of them. I identify most strongly as a citizen of the world or perhaps, that is how I wish to be perceived. Maybe this is why I resisted so fiercely to answering the frequent question of my youth, 'But where do you come from originally?'  In truth I have no recollection of a former life prior to being born. All that backstory is filled in as ones future narrative unfolds. Why then should it have been a subject of such scrutiny when I was too young to understand the reasons behind their interrogations? I understand better...

Experiencing a verse novel for young people is like discovering chocolate crackles are good for you. It’s a marvellous, heart-enveloping revelation, something you instantly want more of and know you’ll never be able to live without again. These two verse novels, one for juniors and the other for middle graders, by accomplished Aussie writers evoke the best chocolate crackle feels and more besides. You must experience them. Are You There, Buddha? Wise, satirical, poignant and alarmingly en pointe, Are You There, Buddha? reads with the ease and speed of a verse novel but involves the reader with so much immersive authenticity, you feel you have experienced something much greater. Bridget, aka, Bee is a tween wobbling on the precipice of teenage-hood, facing all the terrifying manifestations this transformation attracts. Her body is betraying her in increasingly alarming ways, morphing into a lumpy, bumpy, hairy hideous illusion of her former self. She has just started Year 7 and unlik...

I often take a ridiculously long time to get around reading something I feel is going to be good. Rather like leaving the roast potatoes (my favourite part) to the very end of a roast dinner. Then suddenly a book will call to me, wanting to be read. I believe this way invites a more organic reading experience. And what a book at such a time! Lizzie and Margaret Rose is a gripping middle grade novel by accomplished historic children's author, Pamela Rushby set in the early years of World War II. Rushby wastes no words on superlative mundane description rather chisels her supremely defined characters from the world in which they exist. From the shrapnel strewn streets of London to the balmy coastal suburbs of Townsville, Rushby's talent for honing emotion from action allows readers to engage head on with ten-year-old Margaret Rose and her eleven-year-old Australian cousin, at least this reader did in a way that required the occasional swiping away of tears. When Margaret R...

ABCs and 1 2 3s are not only the fundamental building blocks for learning and communicating, they establish connections with ourselves, our cultures and humanity as a whole. These next few picture books are perfect for exploring those connections, introducing sounds, letters and numbers to pre-schoolers whilst providing sound material for ever important reading time, during lockdown time or anytime! B is For Baby ABC books come in an infinite number of guises. This one is singularly different because it focuses on just one letter of the alphabet rather than all 26, in this case, the letter B. We begin with the obvious, Baby but as the story evolves, we and baby are introduced to a marvellous collection of other B words: beads, basket for example. But what is in the basket…? Bananas of course! Or is it something more? This spectacularly illustrated non-fiction picture book is really a cyclical visual journey of baby’s unplanned journey from her African village into town where...

Goat on a Boat is a fun rhyming romp across a deserted volcanic island that reminds me a lot of places in the Aegean but the end pages and name (Joxx) intimate a more Hebridean nature. A flock of dismal looking sheep eke out a meager existence among the lower marshes and barren rock faces of Joxx. The grass, what little there is of it there, is thin and unappetising. Life is rudimentary at best. One day they spy a boat which brings to shore a stranger; a goat of all things. He's different and if the sheep's leader, Bighorn Bill can be believed, must not be allowed to infiltrate their home. Who knows how much he'll eat or who else he might invite to come ashore. Better to stand firm, lock him up, bite him into submission if necessary warns Bill. But among the motley crew, a young, dark-wooled ewe speaks up, imploring the others to give him a chance. Bill finds it hard to extinguish his prejudices and pre-conceived fear-induced beliefs and while he bleats and bemoa...

Tristan Bancks signed my copy of Detention with a note hoping it kept me turning pages . This book lived up to that promise and then some. Packed with page-turning tension and relentless drama, this is one middle grade novel that may cause a few kids to miss their dinner call. Yet despite the raw gritty urgency that suffuses nearly every page and the elevated sense of dread and desperation that keeps your heart in top gear, the pace is never too manic nor too hectic to enjoy the energising mix of edgy excitement and sincere emotion Bancks does so well. Dan is an inner suburban boy living on the outer perimeters of life. He’s classified as trailer park trash because of his permanent residence at the social-economically deprived Midgenba caravan park. It’s a title that comes with an ineradicable smear of hopeless. Deep down though, Dan’s a good kid, a caring kid. The type of kid who’ll risk his own face to save a vicious dying dog, which he does one day after finding Rosco tied ...

Wai Chim's latest YA is a tempting hot pot of teenage coming-of-age angst, family values, cultural cohesion, mental health oh and yes, dumplings! This is a hearty, satisfying read about Anna, the eldest child in a Chinese immigrant family who rely on the family restaurant to survive. That premise alone could have been redolent with cultural stereotypical clichés however Chim has blended Anna's story with the careful addition of a host of interesting and authentic ingredients; characters like, Rory, who is the local delivery boy for the restaurant and also, ultimately Anna's first love and saviour. As Anna trudges through her 11th year in High School, she is repeatedly put upon to keep the home fires burning for her younger tween sister, Lily and 6-year-old baby brother, Michael. Their overworked father is rarely at home, dossing in the restaurant storeroom under a cover of avoidance. Perhaps the character that both disturbs and delights the most is Ma, Anna's m...

Remy Lai’s debut middle grade novel, Pie In the Sky is one hefty hunk of a book (all 384 pages of it) yet it reads as effortlessly as a cloud-light Angel Cake. This hybrid graphic novel is an appetizing combination of so many elements attributed to crossing cultures and fitting in, you’d be forgiven for feeling as though you’ve bitten off too much to swallow however, Lai’s wit and sincere prose resonates warmly from start to finish producing one of the most satisfying reads I’ve ever consumed.   It’s hard to refrain from baking puns when reflecting on Jingwen’s story. I blame Lai . She has given the new-kid-in-a-new-country-in-a-new-school-finding-it-impossible-to-fit-in storyline a deliciously original twist by blending winsome characters into emotionally and physically charged situations involving frequent cake making. Honestly, there is more elaborate baking in this book than an entire season of Master Chef. Almost twelve Jingwen and his younger brother, Jangh...