The Trytth Chronicles? in Shakespeare now!

The Trytth Chronicles? in Shakespeare now! by Goldie Alexander (A Five Senses Publication Anthology Edition) RRP $34.95  ISBN 9781760322601

Reviewed by Claire Stuckey

Miranda and her father Prospero live on a space station for many years with two non human creatures having been wrongly exiled from Naples2. We discover each character's role developing as a damaged spaceship approaches after a meteor storm. With the arrival of other humans including his corrupted bother Alfonso, Prospero tries to manipulate the meeting of Miranda with the young man Ferdinand. He underestimates the creature Caliban who he has harshly controlled in the past. His focus on the young distracts him further from observing the conniving but stupid lust for power by Stepheno and Pincolo.

Shakespeare's story The Tempest is followed more directly in this dystopian tale.  Although set on a spaceship, then on the planet of Trytth, we follow the main characters facing the trials and tribulations created by  the greed and anger of the Xrobb creatures. Guided and empowered by the friendship of the Trytth creatures the young couple survive and triumph while displaying love, courage and intelligence; positive traits that give authority to their survival and ultimate power in realising the return to leadership roles on Naples 2.

The Trytth, however friendly eventually ask them to leave with a strong message that their human characteristics have had major negative consequences on their own planets, a future that don't wish to share. Miranda's long-term intense education revealed in the opening scene causes her to question each episode in their adventures and concludes with her measured response to returning to human civilization. 

This story has many of the same characters as the original from which it is adapted. It provides a cautionary message as to the positive and negative traits of human beings. The setting makes an interesting read with in depth descriptions of the planet it's terrain, flora and fauna. A narrative to establish not only the setting, the dangers and advantages for the characters but also to provide back ground for the environmental message. A long but interesting adaptation of a play I have not seen, so this adaptation provided me with insight to this Shakespearean story.  

Changing History? in Shakespeare Now!

Changing History? in  Shakespeare Now! by Goldie Alexander (Five Senses Education) Anthology Edition RRP $34.95  ISBN 9781760322601

Reviewed by Claire Stuckey

In 2017 Taylor travels to Berlin with her grandfather Opa to visit the city that family fled in the 1920's. Her future is currently unclear with her dancing a focus but is she good enough for it to be a career? She escapes an overbearing mother, and a boyfriend she wants to dump but only to fall into a desperate and dangerous situation.

Waking up in 1928, Taylor has a bad concussion and no money, but she is helped by a young man called Rom. Despite the hardship of his own Jewish family, he aids Taylor's recovery, then assists in finding her a job and a place to stay. Taylor has never worked so hard, shared so little food, money or comfort. She makes friends and enemies while struggling to work at night eventually dancing with Juliet on stage to pay her way. Her friendship with Rom and Juliet educates her on the influences of religion and class in a society also struggling with political and cultural change in a dynamic economic environment. Their situation is difficult; both are restrained by family pressures, both are caring, but very much in love.

Taylor shares her time-travel secret with the couple who respond with much interest. Her revelations on the rise of the Nazi party and the consequences becomes a catalyst for a plan to poison Hitler on a visit to the restaurant where they work. The plan is foiled by an informer, Taylor does not escape the wrath of party officials. Saved once again, she lives rough on the streets until she returns to the present day, in hospital, with a terrible head injury. Taylor returns home with significant changes to her views on her life, family and her future. Opa finds a photo of his parents and Taylor realises that the family history is entwined with her own Berlin journey.

Although I knew much of the history surrounding this story, I enjoyed travelling with Taylor into this period. Unlike the original play, the young couple survive.  As an historical story it provides a good entry point into German socialism and the religious intolerance in the pre-war period.  

It may make Shakespeare more readable for students, but this story diverts markedly from the tragedy of the young lovers in the original. Highly readable, I did not try to look for the comparisons like I have in others stories in this series but enjoyed the time-travel adventure with well-drawn characters arranged in an dynamic setting.  

Cybertricks

Cybertricks by Goldie Alexander (Five Senses Education) PB RRP $19.95

Reviewed by Sally Odgers

Pya, Zumie, Jafet and Trist are twelve years old. Like any other children on the cusp of their teens, they take an interest in their appearance and in their peers. They squabble among themselves and  chafe against the benevolent rule of their tutors. Yet Pya and the others are not typical children. They are Hatchlings, the cloned descendants of an Earth rendered uninhabitable by the Great Disaster compounded of war, famine and plague. And as far as Pya knows, they are the only Hatchlings alive today.

ComCen and the holo-tutors put the Hatchlings through their paces, allowing them to interact only as avatars, but sending them to many different places via Virtual Reality. ComCen says they must learn how to cooperate, but Pya longs for true bodily freedom from her tiny Cell.

Be careful what you wish for.

Stranded on Earth at the dawn of the Great Disaster on the 21^st Century, the Hatchlings meet Rio and Charlie, who are also twelve years old. That’s when they realise how different they are.  That’s when they realise how dangerous this longed-for freedom can be. Separated from Rio’s and Charlie’s family, the six take a long and hazardous trek. The situation is bizarre, but the characters ring true. The Hatchlings struggle towards humanity as the human children try to adjust to the loss of their once-secure future.  Has ComCen abandoned the Hatchlings?  Is this some cruel game? As the shared experience becomes more perilous, Goldie Alexander keeps a firm hand on the reins of her story, moving the action from setting to setting, each one clearly depicted. The characters grow and develop, while the situation is always accessible. The author’s eye is warm and compassionate, but she doesn’t flinch from the harsh reality of an adventure where nothing is quite as it seems to the protagonists.

Cybertricks

Reviewed by Anastasia Gonis

This terrific futuristic fantasy novel is set in the Great Southern Continent, Terra, in 14,043. Pya, one of four Hatchlings that survived the Great Disaster, exists in a Cell as do the other three Hatchlings, mascs Jafet and Trist and Zumie, the only other fem. All are nourished via food tubes and educated by ComCen, a super computer, while communication is conducted via their avatars.

Their Tutor-Holo is trying to teach the Hatchlings to work together cooperatively and independently. With this crucial end in view, and forced to face Reality, they are sent back to 2043 to exercise all they have learnt and to focus on working as a team.

Returning to the past where families existed, they meet twins Charlie and Rio, and the six children set out on a journey that will change them forever. While experiencing Reality, they must overcome great challenges, learn sustainability within many lifestyles, and slowly come together to understand the words of their tutor ‘only through great effort and understanding can another Great Disaster be averted’.

All of Goldie Alexander’s novels have positive themes of self worth, personal improvement, environmental issues and sharing the world’s resources flowing through them in subtle waves in one form or another. In this highly imaginative and well-crafted novel, many similar life sustaining themes appear. The leading characters are strong and powerful, and the weaker ones always evolve and improve by the end of the story.

Neptunia

Neptunia by Goldie Alexander (Five Senses)
PB RRP $16.95
ISBN 97891741308716
Reviewed by Anastasia Gonis

Cassie is a strong swimmer capable of competing in the State Championships. But her parents’ break-up puts a stop to her dream of going to Norris Park College with its outstanding sports facilities and pool. Cassie and her little brother Timmy are sent to Ithaca, a country town with no pool, to stay with distant relatives till the storm passes.

The children find a metal box in an abandoned silo. It is one of many things stolen from Iris Laertes, a world champion swimmer who lives on the property Neptunia. The box is ‘a magic entry into a mythical land’.  Cassie is swept into the greatest adventure and challenge of her life - to swim to the mythical Neptunia with a message of an environmental disaster that could destroy its many species of marine life.

The story loosely incorporates myths and legends attached to Homer’s Odyssey while weaving environmental issues into the magical fabric of the story. The many themes contained in this well crafted and imaginative story include overcoming obstacles through strategy, strength and spirit, self belief, and courage to triumph over difficulties.

eSide

eSide by Goldie Alexander (A Five Senses Publication)

PB RRP $17.99

ISBN 978-1-74130-774-0

Reviewed by Alison Peters (https://www.facebook.com/alisonpeterswriter?ref=hl)

Sam and her best friend Melody live in the colourful beachside town of Squeaky. Sam’s mum Kate runs the Conch Café, the bustling meeting place for Squeaky’s weird and wonderful collection of residents. There’s Bob Rampol, the friendly senior citizen who watches the world from his favourite spot on the café’s balcony, waiter Manuel Alphonso Demetrious, world famous opera singer Mrs Canzone, and the Affington brothers - muscle bound twins who run the local fitness centre.

But all is not well in Squeaky. Mrs Canzone’s lost her voice,  the twins’ fitness centre is failing as client after client suffers sprains, strains and breaks. Manuel, (or Manny) has burned his arm so badly he can’t work in the café, and Kate is struggling to keep the place running on her own.

It seems a dark cloud hovers over Squeaky, but Sam and Melody suspect there’s somebody behind the town’s run of bad luck- the terrifying Hecate Badminton. Hecate has one thing on her mind - Eternal Life. And it seems Sam and her mother Kate have the secret right there on the counter of the Conch Café…

When the café burns to the ground, Sam and Melody are forced into action - armed only with a rudimentary understanding of Tae Kwan Do and a mysterious monitor given to them by magician, The Great Franco, the girls venture into strange virtual worlds where they meet Hecate, and confront evil head on.

eSide is a tale of witchery and digital adventure told with quirky humour.  Goldie Alexander’s story is dense, with scenes and detail lovingly rendered in a unique voice. Mid to upper primary readers will enjoy the novel’s cast of crazy, nasty, nutty and nice characters, and intricately imagined virtual worlds.

Bruno Fiddlestein’s Dilemma, Mrs Papadopoulos’s Purple Hippopotamuses and Widow Hegarty’s Goat

Bruno Fiddlestein’s Dilemma, Mrs Papadopoulos’s Purple Hippopotamuses and Widow Hegarty’s Goat: collections of short stories by Vashti Farrer, illustrated by Naomi Kelly (Five Senses Education P/L)
PB RRP $12.95 each
Reviewed by Felicity Pulman

Vashti Farrer’s humorous and quirky short stories and poems have long been enjoyed by readers of NSW School Magazine, and her work will now reach a far wider audience with the publication of both old and new stories in these collections with subtitles: ‘stories to snortle at,’ ‘tall tales,’ and ‘unlikely escapades’. Readers will chortle over the antics of such things as a friendly emu called Ethel, a pair of naughty purple hippopotamus slippers, a pigeon with street smarts, the match-making goat of Widow Hegarty, and the garden gnomes who make themselves useful. They’ll also discover how Miss Muffet overcame her fear of spiders, and what happens when you play the violin to vegetables.

Of particular interest to my grandchildren were the fun stories about their favourite animals: cats and dogs that often got into trouble or had to save their owners. Some old favourites are also included in the collections: the stories of Lulubelle and Bones, Mr Pavlov’s Possum, and Green Piece’s Princess Euphorbia (ribbit!)

Alert readers will enjoy the puns. Imagine having classmates with names like Will Argue, Aidan Abbett, Wanda Round, Iona Broome and Luke Heare, and being taught by Miss Happ!

Naomi Kelly’s delightful drawings illustrate most of the stories and poems, adding an extra dimension of fun. Enjoy these wonderful collections, and remember:

‘Don’t maffle, cronk or chimble

When a bumblepuppy’s nigh,

It might clawscrunt up your mazzard

Nurk your goblocks on the sly.

It might knoup your knevel slister,

Sloom your snortle on the run,

Till you’re faffled, motched and gloppened

And it’s had its bit of fun.’

(c) Felicity Pulman, 2011