If you think there's no laughter left in a remote, doomed town, think again. This is the story of Wittenoom that the press didn't cover. While the media focussed on the terminal effects of asbestos and mesothelioma, many of the inhabitants got on with a wonderfully individual and rewarding way of life in some of the most spectacularly beautiful country in Australia. If you walked into Wittenoom today, you would find the remaining locals trying to mend telephone lines that Telstra won't let technicians touch for fear of asbestos in the air, in an all but deserted little town. But it wasn't always so. As the writer, Lesley Styles, painter and author, recounts, "Wittenoom was once the rowdiest, bounciest, lives-every-ounciest place you're ever likely to run into. Or, on occasion, out of. It was a bubbling cauldron of diverse characters, a last bastion of individualism - so rare a thing these days." So this is the inside story, spanning 1968 to 1995: the fun, the tragedies, the floods, the cyclones, the army maneouvres, the barbeques, the births, the deaths, the tourists, the school camps, the hospital, the scenery, the wildlife and back at the gallery with Lesley Styles and Val Charlton. As the author says of her book, "jam packed with characters and absolutely no plot" - but it certainly has a story! If you've ever wondered what life is really like away from the coastal cities, in a tiny outback town, Back at the Gallery will give you an insight. If you've ever wondered what it might be like to chuck it all in and walk away from city life forever, Back at the Gallery is one person's experience. (Bookseller blurb)
