Two books and a birthday

Books have always played a big part in the life of our family.  From youngest to oldest, we all enjoy turning the pages. Some of us also listen to audiobooks, one edits bestsellers, another is the head book buyer for a national chain.

And now we have not one, but two published authors! 

 

A couple of weeks ago I attended the Sydney launch of Wish You Were Here, a seriously entertaining memoir by my talented sister-in-law, Sheridan Jobbins. 

Sheri has been writing for many years, first as a journalist and then as a filmmaker and scriptwriter, but with this book she's turned the spotlight on herself, taken a period when life threw some hefty lemons her way, and made delicious lemonade. 

Basically, after her first husband broke her heart, she broke some china before running off to America to find herself, on a road trip across the country in a red Chevy Camaro. Of course I know the ending, but I'm still enjoying being taken along for the ride as I read this positive, life-affirming and insightful 'rom-com'.

A few days later we celebrated my mother-in-law Joy Jobbins' 90th birthday with another book launch - Life at the Palace.

 

On her 80th birthday Joy, Sheridan's mother, had published Shoestring, a memoir of her experiences as a working mother of five, 'tycooning' as an advertising executive in the male-dominated fashion and wool industry of the 1950s, while living 'on a shoestring' in the rural bohemia of Eltham, Victoria.  

Life at the Palace, A Necklace of Anecdotes, is the second of a trilogy she has planned, this time set in Sydney's Elizabeth Bay in the 60s and 70s, where the family found themselves living (for a peppercorn rent) in Berthong, an enormous harbour-side mansion that could not have been more different from Shoestring. 

The cast of colourful characters who lived there, or visited (I was one!), along with Joy's wider professional encounters with the likes of Prince Phillip, Pierre Cardin and Patrick, Earl of Lichfield, makes for an entertaining romp with a touch of the bittersweet, periodically 'interrupted' by other members of the family for a tiny reality check.

 Along with the book launch it was a wonderful afternoon of celebration and dancing, which of course included Joy's theme song "Fly me to the Moon".

Joy's another positive woman who knows exactly what to do with the lemons life gives her. Margaritas, anyone?

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Wish You Were Here, by Sheridan Jobbins, is available at all good bookshops in Australia, as well as online through Amazon and Book Depository if you are overseas.

Life at the Palace (A Necklace of Anecdotes), by Joy Jobbins, is available in Australia here