("Geraldine hadn't wanted the white guinea pig at all. But...)
"Geraldine hadn't wanted the white guinea pig at all. But then a single, sudden act of sympathy exploded into something difficult and dangerous, like a kiss given to the wrong person." Winner of the New South Wales State Literary Award, the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award, and shortlisted for the Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award. A novel about childhood, change, and the mystery of a missing guinea pig. Filled with Ursula Dubosarsky’s signature comic characters and situations as eleven-year-old Geraldine searches for belonging, both in her family and the wider world.
(Dubosarsky's classic award-winning novel about 12-year-ol...)
Dubosarsky's classic award-winning novel about 12-year-old Samuel, his half-sister Theodora, and their eccentric energetic Jewish family living in contemporary Sydney, Australia. A funny and very touching story about children caught between the past and the future. Read and loved in homes and classrooms all over Australia, and republished in Germany in 2013. Winner of the NSW Premier's award for children's books, Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Honour book and shortlisted for the Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature.
(In her hand was a hinged wooden box with a black clasp. O...)
In her hand was a hinged wooden box with a black clasp. On the lid was a painting of a white bird with a long neck, its wings stretched out in flight. Fred rubbed it with her fingers, wiping away the dust. 'The Game of the Goose,' she read slowly. 'Open it,' said Rowley ... Fred, Rowley, and Rabbit hardly knew each other before the game. But the game changed everything. It took each of them on an adventure – a terrifying, wonderful journey that they would remember forever.
("For every child that is lost," said Dr Fleet, his voice ...)
"For every child that is lost," said Dr Fleet, his voice dropping, "another must be found." Sarah shook her head at the floor. "In the circle," whispered Dr. Fleet, "there can be no gaps, no spaces. Loss and gain, a child for a child. There is a circle. A child for a child, for a child." The children play with a mysterious doll’s house on a remote Australian property named "Abyssinia." Or are the children really dolls themselves? Inspired by the historic house and farm at Rouse Hill in the west of Sydney.
(The sequel to Dubosarsky’s much-acclaimed "The First Book...)
The sequel to Dubosarsky’s much-acclaimed "The First Book of Samuel." Samuel and Theodora’s flamboyant opera-singing father goes missing while their grandfather reveals more family secrets. A compelling story, both funny and dramatic, that unfolds as the past and the present collide. Winner of the New South Wales Premier’s Literary Award and the Victorian Premier's Literary Award. Cover illustration and design by Amy Golbach.
(From one of Australia's finest writers for young people c...)
From one of Australia's finest writers for young people comes this evocative novel juxtaposing the inner life of three girls, the undercurrents of their parents' marriage, and the political dramas of the adult world The earth smelt strong to Matilda and full of things growing and dying all at the same time. She thought about the grey-green tangled bush at the end of her street, full of cowboys and Red Indians, waiting with their guns and their bows and arrows. She thought about the Japs and the Germans and the shining sword and chocolate biscuits, and the Argonauts sailing across the ocean, and the silver trail of snails on cardboard.
The Word Snoop: A Wild and Witty Tour of the English Language!
(Meet the Word Snoop. She's dashing and daring and witty a...)
Meet the Word Snoop. She's dashing and daring and witty as can be and no one knows more about the evolution of the English language than she does. Luckily, she's spilling her secrets in this gem of a book. From the first alphabet in 4000 BC to anagrams, palindromes, and modern-day text messages, readers will learn all about the fascinating twists and turns our fair language has taken to become what it is today. With playful black-and-white illustrations, riddles to solve, and codes to break, The Word Snoop is definitive proof that words can spark the imagination and are anything but dull. This is a book for every aspiring writer and every true reader.
(When their teacher goes missing during an outing, eleven ...)
When their teacher goes missing during an outing, eleven girls grapple with the aftermath in this haunting, exquisitely told psychological mystery. The Vietnam War rages overseas, but back at home, in a year that begins with the hanging of one man and ends with the drowning of another, eleven schoolgirls embrace their own chilling history when their teacher abruptly goes missing on a field trip. Who was the mysterious poet they had met in the Garden? What actually happened in the seaside cave that day? And most important - who can they tell about it? In beautifully shimmering prose, Ursula Dubosarsky reveals how a single shared experience can alter the course of young lives forever. Part gripping thriller, part ethereal tale of innocence lost, The Golden Day is a poignant study of fear and friendship, and of what it takes to come of age with courage.
Ursula Dubosarsky is an Australian writer of fiction and non-fiction for children and young adults. She has won nine national literary prizes, including five New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards, more than any other writer in the Awards 30-year history.
Background
Dubosarsky was born Ursula Coleman on June 25, 1961, in Sydney, Australia, the daughter of Peter, a writer, and politician, and Verna, a writer, Coleman. Dubosarsky as a child enjoyed books by Maurice Sendak, Enid Blyton, and other imaginative authors.
Education
Dubosarsky studied at Sydney University, earning a Bachelor of Arts with honors in 1982, and a Diploma of Education in 1989. She then received a Ph.D. in 2007 from Macquarie University.
Graduating from the university in 1982, Dubosarsky spent two years in Canberra as a researcher for the Australian Public Service while writing in the evenings. She lived for a year on an Israeli kibbutz where she met her Argentine-born husband. Returning to Sydney in 1986, Dubosarsky worked as a researcher for Reader's Digest, married, and began raising her three children.
Dubosarsky's first published picture book, Maisie and the Pinny Gig, tells the story of a young girl and her imaginary friend, Pinny Gig. Also for young readers are several books in the "Aussie Bites" series of beginning readers, among them The Strange Adventures of Isador Brown and its sequels, The Even Stranger Adventures of Isador Brown and Isador Brown's Strangest Adventures of All. Part of the "Aussie Nibbles" series of readers, Dubosarsky's The Two Gorillas is a highly entertaining story about how a pair of stuffed gorillas are treated by their rambunctious owner.
In Rex, another title designed for young readers, Dubosarsky chronicles the adventures of Rex, the chameleon class pet, as he goes home with each student. As the classmates take care of Rex in turn, each chronicles his or her adventures, and the pictures that accompany the student's words are drawn in a childlike style. Rather than just staying at the student's home, the chameleon is often taken to movies or restaurants; in one case, he is dressed up to play with a little girl's Barbie dolls. Through the children's imaginations, Rex is transformed from a humble chameleon to a powerful dinosaur.
High Hopes is one of many novels Dubosarsky has written for older readers. The novel focuses on twelve-year-old Julia. The preteen's concern over her widowed father's new girlfriend leads her to bake a "poisoned" cake - one with an entire bottle of vanilla in it - in an effort to derail the romance. Although her harmless plot fails, Julia eventually accepts her father's need for companionship and reconciles herself to the addition of a stepmother to the family.
The mysterious letter at the heart of Dubosarsky's Zizzy Zing leads young Phyllis back in time to 1938 and into the most horrifying summer of her life. Dubosarsky cut her teeth on this mystery novel, which she wrote years before the publication of her first two books. As she worked on the book, Dubosarsky knew only that she wanted to create a murder mystery where the child was the detective; what she ended up with was perhaps a bit more of a ghost story than mystery, teaching her that the best stories are sometimes as much a surprise to the writer as they are to the reader.
Abyssinia, like Zizzy Zing, is a mystery novel that involves time shifting. In the story, sisters Mary and Grace live in rural Australia, where a dollhouse is one of their few playthings. As Dubosarsky's story unfolds, readers learn that there is a strange connection between the stories the girls concoct for their dolls and their own lives, a connection that becomes alarmingly clear when one of the girls disappears.
Rather than using time travel to bring her readers into the past, Dubosarsky wrote her award-winning novel The Red Shoe as straight historical fiction. Set in 1954, the novel describes the lives of three sisters: fifteen-year-old Elizabeth, eleven-year-old Frances, and six-year-old Matilda. Told in the third person, the text focuses on Matilda's perspective, particularly the little girl's fantasies about the mysterious neighbors living in the large house next door. When Matilda makes a connection between a newsreel she sees about a Russian diplomat who defected to Australia and her neighbors, she tells another neighbor that they are surrounded by spies. The Red Shoe includes excerpts from actual 1954 newspaper articles, giving readers a deeper picture into time and place.