Cirrus@Austlit

'The perimeter of  the New Gaol on Norfolk Island features imposing walls set with three archways, one high and two low. The setting sun throws long shadows onto vivid green grass and the light bleaches the view through the arches to a gentle haze. This is all that remains of the pentagonal panopticon built during the third phase of convict transportation (1825–1855) to this island situated some 1,500 kilometres off the east coast of Australia. And though the prison’s buildings are long gone, these arches were once a gateway into the architecture of Great Britain’s global penal system – the ‘ne plus ultra…of convict degradation’, as Robert Hughes put it in The Fatal Shore (Knopf, 1986). What is now an elegant, slightly surreal parkland – a landscape that is picture-book perfect – is also preternaturally silent: a remnant of the comprehensive system of colonial justice and punishment that first brought the authority and might of the British Empire to this part of the world.' (Introduction)

'One recent Saturday morning, I once again drove my children to the street in Brisbane’s west where I grew up as a boy.

'They had been on this journey too many times to remember: the pleasant drive through The Gap in the Taylor Range, past the old jam factory and the golf course, left into Payne Road and then sharp left into the dogleg that is Bernarra Street.' (Introduction)

'A year ago, feeling hopeless about my work as a freelance writer, I began to look for other ways to bring in money – something steadier to tide me over, with possibly even fair pay. One night, I saw a fiftysomething scientist talking on TV about her job dissatisfaction, how she’d left her position, moved to a coastal town with ocean views, and was loving the freedoms of being a remote court transcriber. I thought: maybe I could do that, and while I didn’t move to a beach, I did go onto the website of Australia’s biggest court transcription company to investigate what such work involved.' (Introduction)

'On Saturday 15 March 2014, my stepmother Genee was shot twice in her bed in Johannesburg. No. That’s misleading: ‘was shot’ suggests she might still be alive. Genee died on 15 March 2014.

'No. That’s misleading too. Without the other detail, ‘died’ suggests she was old and had a heart attack or stroke. Natural causes, if such things still exist.'  (Introduction)

'It's May, the end of the wet season in Far North Queensland, and storm clouds brew ominously to the north. We’ve already driven for three hours from Mossman, including an hour along the four-wheel-drive-only Bloomfield Track, to Home Rule, south of Cooktown, where we are about to embark on a three-day walk to an isolated tropical beach: Cedar Bay.

'My companion Greg is a National Parks ranger and is here to assess the track for the upcoming dry season. My motives for the walk are different: I’m seeking out a story. Cedar Bay has a reputation, and I want to see the place for myself. In August 1976, during the era of Joh Bjelke-Petersen, the Queensland Police Force launched a raid on the isolated hippie community living there. The bungled raid has become part of the local folklore.' (Introduction)

'For the entirety of my childhood – all through the ’90s, the early noughts – I watched my father go through the same routine. Most days, he rose before the sun, putting on the kettle and sipping coffee as he watched the darkness fade into light. His uniform would be ironed and laid out from the night before, each crease perfectly pressed, just as he learned in the army. He would brush his teeth, comb his bushy hair and kiss us – his children – goodbye, before pushing out the door to make the twenty-minute drive to the Etna Creek jail, just outside Rockhampton.'  (Introduction)

'In April 2015, the Australian media is awash with stories of Australians in international prisons for drug trafficking. The death penalty is a hot topic of conversation. Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran will be executed in Indonesia in a matter of days. When your brother is among the stories being reported, you trawl the articles for information, clues into what is going on. You look for common details in the cases and compare legal jurisdictions. You search for something that might tell you why they did it – and why he did it, too. Tony was detained in March 2014 and formally charged in October; the verdict was handed down in April 2015. It made headlines: ‘Life or death for SA jockey in China.’ (Introduction)