The Diaries of Ethel Turner

Many of her early stories first appeared in The Bulletin. Here, her granddaughter, Philippa Poole, has selected the most interesting sequence of events from the author's diaries, from 1889, at the start of her outstanding literary career, to 1930, when with the tragic death of her daughter, Jean, she ceased writing children's books altogether.

Candid and imaginative in life as well as in literature, Ethel Turner's diaries bring her Sydney life in the 1900s into attractive perspective, describing Government House balls and garden parties, and generous gifts bought from the financial success of her books.