Title: E W Cole: Chasing the Rainbow
Author: Lisa Lang
Publisher: Arcade Publications, 2007 (90 pages)
ISBN: 978-0-9804367-0-9
Genre: non-fiction – Australian history, biography

Summary (from Arcade Publications website)

‘The reign of knowledge and humanity is coming’ – EW Cole

Lisa Lang introduces us to Melbourne’s most eccentric entrepreneur, taking us on the journey from EW Cole’s humble beginnings on the Victorian goldfields, to his bold establishment of the world’s largest bookstore, and original publication of the iconic and enduring Cole’s Funny Picture Books.

Comments

I vividly remember reading Cole’s Funny Picture Books when I was in primary school. I remember the covers – black with white writing and the bright rainbow arching across the front – and I remember the optical illusion illustrations and word puzzles. I guess it’s not all that unusual that I never really thought about the person who wrote the books. As a child, the book itself was far more fascinating than any author could be.

As an adult, I have recently started to track down copies of the Cole’s Funny Picture Books. I have a copy of the 67th edition of Coles Funny Picture Book No. 2 and thanks to Suz at Suz’s Space I have a copy of Cole’s Happy Puzzles, which is a collection of ‘Cole’s Happiest Puzzles and Pictures…and Picture-Puzzles madly happily edited by Cole Turnley and Merron Cullum’, Cole’s grandson and great-granddaughter.

Which brings me to E W Cole: Chasing the Rainbow by Lisa Lang, a rather fascinating little book about Edward Cole and his remarkable life. I never realised that Cole played such a significant role as an entrepreneur and part of the Melbourne marketing scene at the turn of the 20th century.

His ingenious marketing techniques make for a very interesting story and I was particularly entertained by his advertisement in the local paper when he decided it was time to find a wife – ‘she must be.. good-tempered, intelligent, honest, truthful, sober, chaste, cleanly, neat, but not extravagantly or absurdly dressy; industrious, frugal, moderately educated, and a lover of home.’ Her certainly had high standards and that’s just part of the list.

I was also fascinated to discover that Cole was a deep thinker who published pamphlets against the White Australia policy prevalent in the early years of Federation. He was also a passionate believer in the importance of education and literacy.

For anyone with fond memories of the Cole’s Funny Picture Books, E W Cole: Chasing the Rainbow offers a well-written, easy to read account of this very interesting man living in a very interesting period of Australia’s history. See the Arcade Publications website for ordering information.

Related links:

Review of E W Cole: Chasing the Rainbow at Suite101.com

Title: Our Family Table
Author: Julie Goodwin
Publisher: Ebury Illustrated, 2010 (243 pages)
ISBN: 978-1-74166-968-8
Genre: Cookbook

Summary (from Random House)

Since taking out the coveted title of Australia’s first MasterChef, Julie Goodwin has been cooking, testing and writing away like mad, preparing to publish her first cookbook.

Julie says: ‘In this book I’m not just presenting recipes but exploring the role of food in families and communities. I want to get people back into their kitchens and promote the joy of food and family. OUR FAMILY TABLE is full of lovely stories and recipes and feasts, with a strong focus on good old-fashioned tucker. ‘

Some recipes are heirlooms passed down in Julie’s family through generations, while others were given to her by friends and neighbours. There are lazy weekend breakfasts to enjoy with the family, weekday and special occasion dinners, barbecue and camp cooking, and cakes, biscuits and puddings galore. Julie also includes recipes she created on MasterChef – such as her now famous lemon diva cupcakes and her passionfruit ‘puddle’ pie.

The final section of the book is Julie’s favourite: a beautifully designed ‘blank’ chapter with pages for the reader’s own photos, clippings and hand-me-down handwritten recipes from family and friends.

With a foreword by Australian culinary icon, Margaret Fulton.

Comments

I was interested to see Julie Goodwin’s cookbook when it finally arrived on the shelves. I love to cook, but confess that the hyper-styled meals and fussy recipes of many celebrity cooks just leave me cold. Some people may be able to balance family, work and social commitments as well as turn out gourmet meals, but I’m afraid I’m just not one of them.

I was a little worried that somewhere between the end of MasterChef Australia 2009 and the release of Goodwin’s cookbook the marketing guru’s would decide to alter Julie’s rather basic cookbook plan to ensure that it would appeal to the foodie fans of the program. I’m very pleased to report that this hasn’t happened and, as I had hoped, Our Family Table is filled with the kinds of recipes that I am likely to make at home for my own family.

I’ve tried out the recipe for Grandma’s shortbread, which was delicious. If you want further confirmation of this, just ask Meredith from Oh, The Thinks You Can Think, who gobbled the shortbreads I took to her place down faster than you can say “Would you like to keep the leftover biscuits for your kids for afternoon tea?” Leftovers? What was I thinking?

I’m sure that this is a recipe book that I will be referring to often. I’m not necessarily likely to write my own recipes in the blank pages at the back, but that’s simply because I have too many to fit. This section does make this cookbook a lovely idea as a housewarming, engagement or wedding present however, with perhaps favourite family recipes already included.

Talking about that shortbread has made me hungry. I think it’s time to put another batch in the oven…

Related links:

Review of Our Family Table at Suite101.com

Before I give all the facts and figures, I’d like to share a wonderful quote from Reading by Moonlight by Brenda Walker, a book that I’ve started during the Read-a-thon.

A good book laces invisible fingers into the shape of a winter armchair or a hammock in the sun. I’m not talking about comfort, necessarily, but support. A good writer might take you to strange and difficult places, but you’re in the hands of someone you trust.

Final Update

• Hours read since last update: 2 hours
• Pages read since last update: 122
• Total hours read: 6 hours 15 minutes
• Total pages read: 328 + 75 minutes of an audio book and a children’s picture book

Final Post Meme

1. Which hour was most daunting for you? I’ve had numerous distractions since the read-a-thon began. The first few hours went well, but after a few hours sleep there were early morning distractions with the kids and then a BBQ lunch with my husband’s family that took 7 hours out of my day. So, no specific hour was daunting but the many interruptions were

2. Could you list a few high-interest books that you think could keep a Reader engaged for next year? An engaging book is such a subjective thing – what interests me might not suit everyone. My suggestion would be to always include a variety of books – something serious, something fun, some non-ficion – and to make sure that at least a few of the books in the Read-a-thon pile are reasonably short so that you can get that wonderful sense of achievement that comes from completely finishing a book.

3. Do you have any suggestions for how to improve the Read-a-thon next year? Read-a-thon is already awesome. How do you improve on that?

4. What do you think worked really well in this year’s Read-a-thon? The Read-a-thon blog is great. It’s wonderful to have a central point with all the links and information. The cheerleaders and mini-challenge hosts also do a great job.

5. How many books did you read? One complete book, 3 partial books, one picture book and half of an audio book on CD.

6. What were the names of the books you read?

• Conspiracy 365: February by Gabrielle Lord (complete – 185 pages)
• Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver (partial – 104 pages)
• Reading by Moonlight by Brenda Walker (partial – 22 pages)
• Macquarie Pen Anthology of Aboriginal Literature (partial – 12 pages)
• Nelson Mandela’s Favorite African Folktales (1 of 2 story CDs)
• Nursery Time with Thomas (Thomas the Tank Engine picture book read with son)

7. Which book did you enjoy most? I particullary enjoyed Before I Fall and Reading by Moonlight and I’m looking forward to finishing both in the next couple of days.

8. Which did you enjoy least? I didn’t have any books that I struggled with.

9. If you were a Cheerleader, do you have any advice for next year’s Cheerleaders? I wasn’t a cheerleader this time around, but I think I’ll put my name down as as a cheerleader for at least some of the next Read-a-thon.

10. How likely are you to participate in the Read-a-thon again? What role would you be likely to take next time? I’m really hoping that I will have the weekend free for the next Read-a-thon. I’ll register as a reader, but I think I’ll skip taking part in the mini-challenges and use that time to be a cheerleader instead. I’ve missed having time to visit the blogs of some of the readers taking part in the Read-a-thon this weekend or chatting with other readers on Twitter.

Just a quick update to let everyone know that I’m still soldiering on with the read-a-thon. After losing 7 prime reading hours during the day at a family lunch, then getting busy organising the kids for the evening and getting them to bed, I now have two more hours reading time left.

I’d love to take part in more mini-challenges and want to send a big THANK YOU out to all the great bloggers that have hosted them, but I want to get some more reading done and I can’t do both. So sorry.

To all the wonderful cheerleaders who have called in to encourage me over the past 24 hours. THANK YOU. You are all awesome. The read-a-thon is so much more fun because you are all part of it.

I’ll post a final round-up once the read-a-thon is over, but for now it’s back to the books.

We’re at hour 13 and I’ve missed the deadlines for quite a few mini-challenges, but I thought I would go back over the ones that have been announced since I went to sleep and take part in some of them anyway.

Mini-Challenge: Rebecca at The Booklady’s Blog - The #Pantyworthy Challenge

Authors as rock stars? Why not. The way to take part in this challenge was reasonably flexible, so I’m choosing to list the authors that I think are “pantyworthy” – the one’s that have written books I can’t wait to recommend to others and those whose books have stayed with me. For more details about what it means to be “pantyworthy”, check out Rebecca’s original Pantyworthy blog post.

• Jasper Fforde – Love, Love Love the Thursday Next series and Fforde’s latest book Shades of Grey
• Chris Cleave – Finished The Other Hand in record time and couldn’t stop myself from underlining sections as I went because I thought they were so amazing.
• Jane Austen – A devoted Austen fan here. How could I not include her on my list?
• Douglas Adams – The Master
• Shakespeare – I’m a traditionalist at heart and I just can’t resist The Bard. Heavens forfend that I would leave him off my PW list.
• Alain de Botton – modern day philosopher
• Terry Pratchett – there’s nothing like a Discworld novel to make me smile. I loved his latest stand-alone novel Nation as well.
• George Eliot – I’ve only read one of Eliot’s books, Daniel Deronda, but I loved it and was absolutely amazed that a woman of her generation could display such a broad general knowledge plus write such an amazing book.

OK. I could go on all day. I’m obviously just a serial author groupie. No doubt I’ll come back and add more names to this list, but I should move on to more mini-challenge catch-ups.

Mini-Challenge: Carrie at Nomad Reader - Where in the World have you Read Today?

Carrie asked readers to visit this Google Map and mark where they had travelled in their reading during the read-a-thon so far. For me, that means Richmond, Australia, Africa and Conneticut in the US. I’m obviously still a bit sleepy, because I can’t work out how to add my markers, but I will head back to the map and do so later.

Mini-Challenge: Joy Renee at Joystory – Reading is Fundamental

This challenge involves reading with a child and I am planning to this later today with my daughter, who is reading The Tale of Despereaux for her school book club. I’ll come back and post some details once we’ve spent our time reading.

If I don’t stop now, I won’t get a chance to get some more reading done before I have to head out to lunch.

Happy Reading Everyone. Hopefully I’ll be able to udpate again soon.

Ok, so it was probably a bit unrealistic to think that I’d only sleep for 3 – 4 hours. Thanks to some ongoing neck/back pain, it took me at least half an hour to get to sleep and then Islept for 5 hours. Since waking up I’ve managed to have breakfast and get some more reading done. I’ve only got about 1.5 hours before I have to head out to a family lunch, so this will be a quick update so that I can grab a shower and hopefully get another hour’s reading done before I have to leave.

Update

Title of book(s) read since last update:

• Conspiracy 365: February by Gabrielle Lord

Number of books read since you started: 3 (partially)

Pages read since last update: 102 pages

Running total of pages read since you started: 206 pages and 75 minutes of the audiobook.

Amount of time spent reading since last update: 1 hour

Running total of time spent reading since you started: 4 hours 15 minutes

I’m about to do a mini-challenges catch-up post, so I will include a list of the mini-challenges I have taken part in with my next update post. I haven’t visited any other readers since my last post either. I’m feeling a bit frustrated by all the interruptions and I’m wondering whether anyone would notice if I disappear into the corner with a book at the BBQ lunch today. It’s probably worth giving it a try.

Happy Reading Everyone.

It’s just hit 3am Sunday morning local time and I think I might head off to bed for a few hours sleep before the kids wake up and the day officially begins.

Before I go to sleep, I thought I would post an update of my progress so far. After getting off to a delayed then slow start, I’ve actually managed to get some reading done in the past couple of hours.

Title of book(s) read since last update:

• Nelson Mandela’s Favorite African Folktales
• Before I Fall – Lauren Oliver

Number of books read since you started: 2 (partially)

Pages read since last update: One CD of the Mandela set and 104 pages of Before I Fall.

Running total of pages read since you started: 104 pages and 75 minutes of the audiobook.

Amount of time spent reading since last update: This is my first official update. So far I have spent 3 hours and 15 minutes reading.

Running total of time spent reading since you started: 3 hours 15 minutes

Mini-challenges completed:
• Intro Challenge
• The Kick off of Champions Challenge

Other participants you’ve visited: So far I’ve left 6 comments. Not many, I know, but I’ve been trying to get as much reading in as I could before I fell asleep. Of the blogs I’ve visited, I’m really keen to go back and have a good look at Allie’s A Literary Odyssey. I love the idea of working through a list of classics, which I guess is what I’ve tried to inspire myself to do with the Popular Penguins Reading Challenge here at Reading Upside Down as well as a few other perpetual reading challenges I have in the pipeline.

OK. Now that I’ve posted an update, I’m off to bed for 3 – 4 hours sleep. I’m really enjoying Before I Fall, but may try something else for a while when I wake up.

Happy Reading Everyone!

We’re in the final minutes of the second hour of the Read-a-thon as I write this. It’s almost midnight here and I’m looking forward to making myself a cup of tea and curling up with a book in just a few minutes.

First, I want to take part in The Kick Off of Champions, the Hour 2 mini challenge hosted by Miss Remmers at Miss Remmers’ Review. I’m afraid it will have to be a boring text post. At the moment, I’m using my laptop and I’ll have to wait for a few hours before I can download some photos to add.

At the moment, I’m sitting in our loungeroom in my pyjamas (an attractive green and hot pink ensemble emblazoned with the phrase ‘boys have cooties’).

I have my books in a pile next to me with my iPod resting on top playing Nelson Mandela’s Favorite African Folktales. The current tale is being read by Matt Damon. Does that mean I can say that Matt Damon and I are curled up on the lounge together enjoying the Read-a-thon? Sounds good to me.

Back to reality. I have to be very careful where I put my feet, as my younger son has an elaborate train track set up on the loungeroom floor and will chastise me in the morning if I move anything.

Once this post is finished, I will go make myself a cup of tea (probably a nice mug of peppermint and English toffee) and I’ll probably start my reading with Lauren Oliver’s If I Fall.

Time to get on with some reading.

OK. So, technically I’m already past ‘Hour 1′ with nary a page read, but since this is my first Read-a-thon as a reader, I’m trying to join in the community fun as well as reading some great books. Besides, I’d hate for all those wonderful cheerleaders to be bored when they call in to visit.

So, here’s my answers to the Hour 1 questions at the Read-a-thon blog:

Where are you reading from today? Newcastle, Australia.

3 facts about me …

• I’ve returned to university this year and am studying for an Arts degree majoring in a Critical and Cultural Studies subject stream.
• I don’t drink coffee, but I love tea. 
• I believe that it isn’t possible to have too many books (despite the fact that my husband thinks I passed that point long ago). 

How many books do you have in your TBR pile for the next 24 hours? I have 11 books (including one audio book) plus my university notes.

Do you have any goals for the read-a-thon (i.e. number of books, number of pages, number of hours, or number of comments on blogs)? I don’t have any definite goals. I’m just looking forward to having an excuse to ignore all my other commitments for 24 hours so that I can indulge in some reading.

If you’re a veteran read-a-thoner, Any advice for people doing this for the first time? This is my first read-a-thon as a reader. Last time I was a cheerleader, which was lots of fun. So, no advice from me except have a good time and enjoy this chance to connect with the great reading community out there.

While I’m catching up with these early posts and getting myself organised, I’m listening to my audiobook choice, Nelson Mandela’s Favourite African Folktales. I’ve just listened to Alan Rickman read a story and now I’m enjoying Whoopi Goldberg. Excellent.

We’re already into the second hour of the Read-a-thon and I’ve read.. well, I’ve read nothing. That’s right. Not a single page, unless you count the back cover blurb of a book that a friend showed me while I was at her house for dinner.

It’s 11.21pm Saturday local time and I’ve only been home for half an hour from dinner with friends. The house is quiet, the kids are in bed and it’s time for my Read-a-thon to begin.

I’m running a bit late, but I’m going to try to catch up on the early mini-challenge posts before I start reading. Once that’s done, I’m all primed and ready to go. I’ve got a pile of books, a laptop and I’ve eaten enough chocolate in the past week to sustain me for at least 24 hours, if not more.

I’ve got 11 books set aside to choose from with a mix of YA and general fiction, non-fiction and some university notes if I get particularly enthusiastic.

I’m not sure that I’ll get to visit many blogs during the Read-a-thon, but I will try to check in to Twitter occasionally and will visit some of the final blog posts once the Read-a-thon is over. 

If you’re a cheerleader or Read-a-thon reader calling in to visit – HELLO! I hope that you have a great time over the next 24 hours and that you discover some great books and book bloggers while you’re cheering everyone one. Thanks for being there to make the Read-a-thon so much fun.