Cirrus@Austlit

'It was as if the present and the past were linked: a spider’s web, wherein a shock to one strand could make the whole structure shake.

'The Kelly family's idyllic holiday in the South of France is disturbed when Cass, a thirteen-year-old girl, goes missing. She's discovered several hours later with no visible signs of injury. Everyone present dismisses the incident as a close brush with tragedy. 
 
'Sixteen years later, at a funeral for a member of the Kelly family, Cass collapses. The present and the past start to collide as buried secrets come to light and old doubts resurface. What really happened to Cass in the South of France? And what's wrong with her now?' (Publication summary) 

'When Roz Chen’s wife, Niamh, is killed in a hit-and-run on a lonely Tasmanian road, the grieving widow begins to wonder if Niamh’s death was an accident after all. Meanwhile, SAS veteran Sam Willard is hoping for a fresh start with a job at a salmon farm. But as allegations of old war crimes surface and Sam is ‘promoted’ as a special operative against anti-salmon farm activists, he and Roz form an unlikely alliance.

'Forced to retreat into the unforgiving Tasmanian wilderness, Roz and Sam find themselves scrambling for the truth with murderous thugs on their trail.' (Publication summary)

'Handywoman Barb Young has lived in the sleepy coastal town of Bullford Point for over fifty years —and frankly, in that time, not much has happened, unless you count that business where a bush turkey managed to board the ferry a couple of years ago.

'When Joe Griffiths returns from Sydney after six years of drug addiction, jail and, eventually, rehab, Barb offers him a job, hoping to help him turn his life around. However, when another new resident of Bullford Point is murdered, Joe becomes the prime suspect.

'Barb thinks the police have got it wrong, but the more she tries to find the truth and clear Joe's name, the more confusing things become. Is the murder connected to the developers circling the waterfront home Joe inherited from his parents? Or to the true crime podcast he has been making about the death of his ex-girlfriend, seven years previously? And what was the information the murdered woman had been trying to horse-trade with police? ' (Publication summary)

'In 1940, as the Nazis sweep toward Lithuania, Japanese diplomat Chiune Sugihara defies his government and secretly issues visas to fleeing Jewish refugees. After the war, Sugihara is dismissed and disappears into obscurity.

'Three decades later, in Australia, Rachel Margol is shocked when her engagement reveals a long-held family secret: she is Jewish. As she grapples with this deception and the dysfunction it has caused, unspoken tragedies from the past begin to come to light. When an opportunity arrives to visit Chiune Sugihara, the man who risked his life to save the Margols during World War II, Rachel becomes determined to meet him. But will a journey to Japan, and the secrets it uncovers, heal the family or fracture them for good?

'The Star on the Grave is a powerful and moving novel inspired by the true story of Chiune Sugihara, and the thousands of people – including the author – who owe him their lives.'  (Publication summary)

'Giulia is ten. She lives on the greenest island in a volcanic archipelago. She has never left. Her best friend, apart from her older sister Giovanna, is a donkey. Giulia and Giovanna's days on the island are shaped by ritual, community, superstition and isolation.

'Until the men arrive. And a foreign yacht anchors at the port. And the vines begin to fail. And everything changes.

'From the author of Dolores, Strangers at the Port is an exquisite, enchanted novel about myth and memory, suspicion and dislocation, emigrants and explorers.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'An honest, very funny account of a couple's move to the country for a fresh start. Bursting with optimism and a can-do attitude, they're on a steep learning curve as they establish a vineyard and learn how things are done

'I imagined lounging on a veranda overlooking folds of hills striped with vines. I'd be clothed in linen and surrounded by friends. On the table would be tumblers of wine we'd picked in last year's harvest. Then we arrived at Cockatoo Hill and discovered a dump.

'When Deirdre and her husband Roger decide to turn a sheep paddock into a vineyard, they were following the centuries old tradition of family wine making. Bit by bit they clean up the land, plant vines, protect them through storms and drought and turn a shack into a cottage. Slowly they start to read the landscape, appreciate the talents of locals and learn what to do when a snake passes by.

'This is a humorous memoir with larger-than-life characters, hard slog and sweet triumph. It is also a story of a deepening awareness of our connection with the land and the rhythms of farming life.' (Publication summary) 

'Just like the garden, the fuse box, the bills, bin night and blown light bulbs, this was just something else she'd now have to take care of herself.

'Recently widowed, Miriam Duffy is a respectable North Shore real estate agent and devoted mother and grandmother. She was thrilled when her younger daughter Ally married her true love, but as time goes by Miriam wonders whether all is well with Ally, as she moves to the country and gradually withdraws, finding excuses every time Miriam offers to visit. Their relationship has always had its ups and downs, and Miriam tries to give her daughter the distance she so clearly wants. But is all as it seems?

'When the truth of her daughter's situation is revealed, Miriam watches in disbelief as Ally and her children find themselves increasingly vulnerable and cut off from the world. As the situation escalates and the law proves incapable of protecting them, Miriam is faced with an unthinkable decision. But she will do anything for the people she loves most in the world. Wouldn't you?

'A stunning, gripping novel that goes to the heart of a mother's love and asks what any of us might do when faced with a threat to the people we hold most dear.' (Publication summary)

'Soldiers have come to the village.
Ren looked up, avoiding Barlow’s words, resting her eyes on the pines that crowded the sky, swamp-green, thick, heavy with resin that stuck to skin and cleared throats, nostrils, eyes.
Barlow was sitting on a large rock. When she didn’t answer, he kept talking.
They’re after something—they won’t say what. But it’s up here. On the mountain.

'REN lives alone on the remote frontier of a country devastated by a coup. High on the forested slopes, she survives by hunting and trading—and forgetting. But when a young soldier comes to the mountains in search of a local myth, Ren is inexorably drawn into her impossible mission.

'As their lives entwine, unravel and erupt—as myths merge with reality—both Ren and the soldier are forced to confront what they regret, what they love, and what they fear.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

An anthology series of children's stories, mixing live-action episodes with animation, clay animation, and puppetry. The stories, aimed specifically at the under 10s, are drawn from a variety of sources, including children's books, fairy tales, myths, and original ideas. Some of the episodes have involved, for example, Snow White as a punk bikie and the seven dwarves as a motorcycle gang; a pet stegosaurus; a boy with wheels instead of toes; and Trevor the glider-plane-catching cat.

According to Patricia Edgar,

Thirty separate self-contained dramas of differing lengths were to be packaged into half-hour episodes. The project was designed to showcase new, creative talent in the television industry. Competitions were run at the Australian Film and Television School and Swinburne Institute of Technology for the best concepts suitable for inclusion in the Kaboodle package, with prizes of $1000 awarded. The Foundation sought promising but inexperienced writers, would-be producers, directors and even accountants who wanted to earn their first credit to enable them to find a future in the industry.

Source: Patricia Edgar, Bloodbath: A Memoir of Australian Television, Melbourne: Melbourne UP, 2006, pp.175-76.

Kaboodle was produced in two series, the first of which included some live-action segements, but the second of which was entirely animated.

For a full list of episodes, see Film Details.

Episode listing for Kaboodle series two courtesy of the Australian Children's Television Foundation.