Was gold miner turned country headmaster Joseph Connor a hero or a villain? When Kate Grenville found a series of 19th century letters either praising him or condemning him, her curiosity was piqued. In ‘The Country Schoolmaster, A Mystery in 88 Letters’ she works her way through the letters trying to understand Connor and what was really happening back then. The book is a complex investigation in which Grenville brings us a fascinating slice of life in the bush in 1880 - floods, fires and poverty and suddenly the extra pressure of  having to send the kids to school.

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The late Moya Costello has been described as a “ a luminous voice in Australian literature”. On the anniversary of Moya’s death Pink Shorts Press have decided to keep that voice alive and have re-released Moya’s 2000 novel ‘The Office as a Boat’. The story is set against a backdrop of a never-ending heatwave and is an amusing  account of claustrophobic office politics combined with a touch of magic realism. A quarter of a century after it first appeared it has a surprising relevance as current office life teeters on the verge of changing forever.

Guests:

Kate Grenville, author

And Cath reviews ‘The Office as a Boat’

Find out more

https://kategrenville.com.au/

@pinkshortspress