Colleen McCullough

I used to read quite heavy books when I was younger but somebody lent me The Thorn Birds to read on holiday and I loved it.So I read The Ladies of Missalonghi afterwards and loved that, too.

Colleen McCullough was ahead of her time when you consider Tim. A beautiful book and very sensitive film. Questions about consent that were not even really thought about when she wrote this never mind about sexuality of those that were thought to be unsexual i.e. women of a certain age and people with disadvantages. Very prescient and evident of her understanding of people and circumstances

Bryce Courtney is pretty good on Australia too, Aveline. The Potato Factory is a real eye opener....

I'm ploughing my way through all her books just now. I'm surrently on the Carmine Delmonico detective ones. I cant say they're my favourites. Will persevere. The Roman series next.

I loved The Thornbirds. Thanks for reminding me of Colleen McCullough! Also read Tim - very unusual and a little disturbing at times, but written beautifully. I loved The Thornbirds series with Richard Chamberlain, but I think James Norton would be perfect in a remake. Must try some more
of hers.

Callistemon21

I hope you enjoy them, Grannmarie

Thank you. I have family in the Perth area, it will be interesting to read about it in an historical fictional setting.

I hope you enjoy them, Grannmarie

Callistemon21

Yammy Anna Jacobswrote books about the Perth area in the early days of colonisation.

The Trader's Series and Swan River Saga as far as I remember.

Callistemon, I found some Anna Jacobs
Trader's books in a charity shop, £1 each, looking forward to reading them.

Thank you, Spice.

Just finished 'Tim'. Awwww. What a book. Most unusual, quite odd really, and so well written.

No, it hasn't been Grannmarie

Hello 👋 Spice! I was wondering if The Creed for the Third Millennium had been made into a film?

Grannmarie, do you mean The Touch? Not made into a movie as far as I know but I wouldn't swear to that.

Northface, I was really taken with The Creed for the Third Millennium too. It was the first ' post Apocalyptic' novel I had read so I was quite impressed. I had read The Thorn Birds previously, and I was amazed at how different they were.
Spice, I recommended it for our Bookgroup and they slated it!

Was it ever made into a film or TV movie?

Callistemon21

Yammy Anna Jacobswrote books about the Perth area in the early days of colonisation.

The Trader's Series and Swan River Saga as far as I remember.

I think I have read one of the Swan River books. My relation was sent to somewhere near there,he always kept in contact with his relations back home and his descendants still do. He was in a fight along with his brother a chap fell and banged his head the unmarried brother took the rap for manslaughter and was transported.
I enjoyed an Indecent obsession as well. DH kept asking what I was reading about.
Thanks, everyone for the recommendations.

Yammy Anna Jacobswrote books about the Perth area in the early days of colonisation.

The Trader's Series and Swan River Saga as far as I remember.

Callistemon21

I hadn't read any of Colleen McCullough's books for years but read The Touch last year and can recommend it.

Another author whose books about early Australia are well-researched and engrossing is Patricia Shaw.
I've read all of hers.

Other authors I can recommend are:

Nancy Cato
Kate Grenville

Thanks, Callitemon for the recommendations I've jotted those authors down. As I said up stream Australian authors and films have always fascinated me. I just recently rewatched "Picnic at Hanging Rock", for about the third time. I like the eerie unworldliness some of them have.
I have convict ancestors who were sent to near Perth and I read a book I think by kate Grenville about the awful lives they lead until given their freedom.

I'm currently reading The Touch by CMc and enjoying it very much.

Over the years I have read many of her books and liked most of them, favourites being Thorn Birds, Tim, Indecent Obsession and Angel Puss. However I could not get along with A Creed for the Third Millennium.

Yammy, I also loved Neville Shute’s On The Beach, and the film. I have just finished “Wool” by Hugh Howey, which is also post-apocalyptic, but found it a bit hard-going at times.
Tim, by Colleen McCullough, is one of my favourite books.

I hadn't read any of Colleen McCullough's books for years but read The Touch last year and can recommend it.

Another author whose books about early Australia are well-researched and engrossing is Patricia Shaw.
I've read all of hers.

Other authors I can recommend are:

Nancy Cato
Kate Grenville

I have recently finished her Masters of Rome series, 7 thick tomes! Apparently she spent 13 years on the research and it shows… a mass of brilliant detail. If you’re at all interested in Roman history, these books put the flesh on its bones

I read The Thorn Birds years and years ago, thought it was wonderful, I've never read anything else by her, can't think why now

Driven, I suppose.

I didn't know about the detective novels. I see that Audible have four out of the five Carmine Delmonicos - not the first one. I might give number two a try.

Borrowbox have the first five of the Rome series as e-books and Tim as an e-audiobook.

"NorthFace* I see she's also written a series of detective novels as well as the Rome ones. How on earth did she manage to produce so many books?! Some are really long too.

I must like books about Australia or Australian authors because I have read quite a few of Neville Shutes. His post Apopalictic one "On the beach ", again was a film with Gregory Peck and Ava Gardiner? I read it as a teenager and asked my dad about all the Nuclear bombs it was very unsettling, they had just opened Sellafied a few miles south of where we lived.