Showing results by publisher "Bolinda Publishing Pty Ltd" in Family Life

Two rural families flee to the city and find themselves sharing a great, breathing, shuddering joint called Cloudstreet, where they begin their lives from scratch. For 20 years they roister and rankle, laugh and curse until the roof over their heads becomes a home for their hearts.

William McInnes' best-selling memoir, A Man's Got to Have a Hobby, takes us back to the long summer holidays of the 1960s and '70s and the last of the baby-boomer childhoods. William narrates with humour and affection about his family and especially his mum and dad, who talked to the TV set and enjoyed life in their house near the bay. William McInnes is a talented writer and a natural storyteller.

For the past 33 years, Angela Gillespie has sent to friends and family around the world an end-of-the-year letter titled ‘Hello from the Gillespies’. It’s always been cheery and full of good news. This year, Angela surprises herself - she tells the truth....

At a suburban barbecue, a man slaps a child who is not his own. This event has a shocking ricochet effect on a group of people, mostly friends, who are directly or indirectly influenced by the incident. In this remarkable novel, Christos Tsiolkas turns his unflinching and all-seeing eye onto that which connects us all: the modern family and domestic life in the 21st century.

In Iraq, Captain Matthew Duffy, recruited by British Intelligence, once more faces a German enemy. But Matthew is confused by his attraction to Diane, now working for the Germans, and finds himself having to make a hard decision. Just as he is coming to terms with his choice, he meets his estranged son, James Barrington Jnr. Back in Sydney, George Macintosh is determined to keep control of his business empire and to prevent his nephew David from taking a seat on the Board. Meanwhile, George’s son Donald is packed off to the family station Glen View.

It is 1918, a year when the War will end, but an even greater killer will arise. On the bloody fields of the Western Front and the battle-scarred desert plains of the Middle East, Tom and Matthew Duffy are facing the enemy. Even as they are trapped on the front lines, they must also find the courage to fight for the women they love when all hope is lost. Back in Australia, George Macintosh is outraged by the stipulations of his father's will that provide for his despised nephew, and is determined to eliminate any threats to his power.

Fred Scully waits at the arrival gate of an international airport, anxious to see his wife and daughter. After two years in Europe, they are finally settling down. He sees a new life before them, a stable outlook again, a fresh start, a cottage in the Irish countryside that he's renovated by hand. He's waited, sweated on this reunion. He does not like to be alone—he's that kind of man.The flight lands, the doors at the airport hiss open...Scully's life falls apart.

When Rosie’s parents were involved in a train accident, her mother was killed and her father left crippled, unable to earn a living and relying on Rosie to keep the wolf from the door. With her mother gone and her sweetheart Adam away in the army, Rosie is lonely. She eagerly awaits the letters from him, but they never come. As she grows more disillusioned, Adam’s best friend Doug goes out of his way to be charming and attentive. Alone and confused, Rosie blossoms under his evil influence.

When the Templeton family from England takes up residence in a stately home in country Australia, they set the locals talking – and with good reason. From the outside, the seven Templetons seem so bohemian, peculiar even. No one is more intrigued by the family than their neighbours, single mother Nina Donovan and her young son Tom. Before long, the two families' lives become entwined in unexpected ways.

‘I can take him away from you any time I want.’ Her mistress’s cruel taunt is deeply disturbing to Jenny Dickens—why would Claudia be interested in a servant’s sweetheart? All the same, Jenny reckons without Claudia’s vicious nature. Using a wily trick, Claudia seduces Frank who, overcome with shame, leaves the household for a new life in Blackburn. Losing Frank is just the first of many disasters that leave Jenny struggling to cope alone.

Maddie's getting it from all sides. Her bitchy new boss at the radio station humiliates her live on air about her figure, her glamour-puss mum keeps dropping not-so-subtle hints that Maddie should lose weight, and her kids are embarrassed to be seen with her after the disastrous mums' race at their school sports day. Something's got to change. Maddie joins the local weight-watching group expecting more humiliation but instead finds two unlikely allies.

Once, Rich and Sandy were environmental activists, part of a world-famous blockade in Tasmania to save the wilderness. Now, 25 years later, they have both settled into the uncomfortable compromises of middle age – although they’ve gone about it in very different ways. About the only thing they have in common these days is their 15-year-old daughter, Sophie.

Polly has always been the high-flier of the family, with the glamorous city lifestyle to match. Clare is a single mum with two children, struggling to make ends meet in a ramshackle cottage. The two sisters are poles apart and barely on speaking terms. But then Polly's fortunes change unexpectedly and her world comes crashing down. Left penniless and with nowhere else to go, she's forced back to the village where she and Clare grew up, and the sisters find themselves living together for the first time in years.

An exploration of relationships, marriage, passion, beauty and the price of love. Zoë Howard is 17 when her brother, Russell, introduces her to Stephen Quayle. Aloof and harsh, Stephen is unlike anyone she has ever met, 'a weird, irascible character out of some dense Russian novel'. His sister, Anna, is shy and thoughtful, 'a little orphan'. Zoe and Russell, Stephen and Anna: they may come from different social worlds, but all four will spend their lives moving in and out of each other's shadow.

Ever been tempted to pretend you were someone exotic, someone adventurous, someone different? Set in Ireland, England and Australia, this is the funny and heart-warming story of two people whose lives are about to turn upside down and inside out. Eva is off to Australia on a break from her job in a Dublin delicatessen, hoping to forget a fizzled romance and find inspiration for a new career. Joseph is taking a holiday from his stressful London job. Each is on a search for some answers about life.

Relieved to take time out from her faltering marriage, Julia Lambett heads across the country to her hometown to help her father move into aged care. But moving an elderly man is easier said than done, especially when her father reveals that a guest has come to stay. Soon after her return, Julia bumps into her childhood friend. True to form, Davina takes a determined interest in all the things that Julia hoped she had left behind. With four decades of possessions that must be managed and dispensed with, Julia finds herself uncovering some long-forgotten, deeply unsettling memories.

Lottie Archer arrives in Rome excited to begin her new job as an archivist. When she discovers a valuable 15h-century painting, she is drawn to find out more about the woman who left it behind, Nina Lawrence. Nina seems to have led a rewarding and useful life, restoring Italian gardens to their full glory following the destruction of World War Two. So why did no one attend her funeral in 1978?

By the Sunday Times best-selling author of The Lie. Forbidden love, intimate betrayal and the devastating power of exposure drive Helen Dunmore's remarkable new title. London, November 1960: the Cold War is at its height. Spy fever fills the newspapers, and the political establishment knows how and where to bury its secrets. When a highly sensitive file goes missing, Simon Callington is accused of passing information to the Soviets and arrested.

Robert Sullivan has been left to raise three-year-old Nancy and her seven-year-old brother Jack by himself.Unable to cope, Robert is driven to abandon his children to those he believes can provide them with a better life. However, he quickly has a change of heart and decides to go back for them. But on the way there, he is involved in a horrific accident.

A compelling tale of two women separated by a century who discover long-buried secrets in an Australian manor house. In 1891, Tilly Kirkland is reeling with shock and guilt after her tempestuous marriage ends in horrific circumstances. Fleeing to the farthest place she knows, Tilly takes a job on Ember Island in Moreton Bay, Australia, where she becomes the governess to the prison superintendent's precocious young daughter, Nell.