Six Degrees of Separation: Wuthering Heights to The Secrets of the Huon Wren

Welcome to this month's edition of Six Degrees of Separation, which is a monthly meme hosted by Kate from Books Are My Favourite and Best. The idea is to start with a specific book and make a series of links from one book to the next using whatever link you can find and see where you end up after six links. I am also linking this post up with The Sunday Salon, hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz and A Good Book and a Cup of Tea hosted at Boondock Ramblings.

This month the starting point is Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. 

When Kate announced this as the starting point, she mentioned that it was in celebration of the current movie adaptation starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi. Another recent movie adaptation that I have seen is Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell, which tells a story about William Shakespeare and his family

I did have several different ideas about other movie adaptations, but instead I am choosing a non fiction read called Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays the Rent by Dame Judi Dench and Brendan O'Hea. In this book, Dame Judi talks about her life working in the theatre in many different roles. It's a fascinating book.

I don't read a lot of non fiction, but I did recently attend a book talk about a book called Survival in Singapore: The triumph and tragedy of Australia's greatest commando operation by Tom Trumble. It tells the story  of a daring raid on Singapore Harbour following the Japanese invasion in 1941 and the aftermath for the citizens of Singapore

I am casting my mind back many, many years now, to a book that has stuck with me. Tanamera by Noel Barber is a book that I remember with great fondness.  Tanamera tells the story of a white family and a Eurasian woman both during the Japanese occupation and in the years afterward during the Malayan conflict. I used to love Noel Barber's books when I read them back in the late 1990s but I am not sure how they would stand up now if I was to reread them. I do still own quite a few of them. Tanamera was made into a mini-series in the late 1980s. 

A more recent WWII and aftermath TV adaptation is The Narrow Road to the Deep North which also stars Jacob Elordi, and was adapted from Tasmanian author Richard Flanagan's book of the same name. 

Now, if this was a 5 Degrees of Separation post then I would have gone full circle back to the starting book given that Jacob Elordi starred in both adaptations but alas, I need to add one more link. I am choosing a book by another Tasmania author. I read both of Claire van Ryn's books last year and thought they were great, so for my final choice I am going to select her book The Secrets of the Huon Wren (my review)

Next month, the starting point is The Correspondent by Virginia Evans which I currently have out of the library!

Will you be joining us?

Top Ten Tuesday: Author sisters

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week's theme is Things Characters Have Said (Maybe a character said something really profound or romantic or hilarious or heartbreaking. You could share witty one-liners, mic-drop moments, snippets of funny dialogue between multiple characters, catchphrases, quotes that have become a part of pop culture–like “May the odds be ever in your favor.”, etc.)

I always struggle with TTT when the theme is about quotes as they are just not something I keep an eye out for, so I am going to go back to an old post I have had in draft for a while. I originally put this post together when the theme was Relationship Freebie (Pick a relationship type and choose characters who fit that relationship as it relates to you. So, characters you’d like to date, be friends with, be enemies with, etc. Bookish families you’d like to be a part of, characters you’d want as your siblings, pets you’d like to take for yourself, etc.), but I didn't get to post it at the time. I think we were away.

I previously did a post featuring the word sisters in the title, so this time I am going to share some authors who are sisters! Let's start with some Australian author sisters:

Liane, Jaclyn and Nicola Moriarty - Whilst Liane is probably the most famous of the Moriarty sisters, Jaclyn and Nicola have also been writing successfully for a long time. Jaclyn writes more in the YA space and Nicola more women's fiction. My favourite book by a Moriarty is probably Paper Chains by Nicola.

Back in 2012 I did a Q and A with Jaclyn Moriarty and asked about the fact that all three of them were writers and this is what she said

Both of our parents are enthusiastic story tellers. We are always saying to Mum, ‘Give us the short version’, and Dad is always advising, ‘Never spoil a good story with the facts’. We had shelves full of books to read when we were kids. Also, instead of giving us pocket money, Dad would commission us to write stories. So I guess we grew up thinking it was the only way to make money.

Here's my review of A Corner of White (it's actually a joint review with Shelleyrae from Book'd Out which I had completely forgotten we did together), and a quote about doing Tim Tam Slams from Free-Falling by Nicola Moriarty

Kate Forsyth and Belinda Murrell - Kate Forsyth is one of my favourite Australian authors, even though I haven't managed to fit in any of her books for quite some time! She writes amazing fairy-tale retellings, is an awesome guest speaker and avid read. Her sister, Belinda Murrell, writes kids books. Interestingly, their great-great-great grandmother, Charlotte Waring Atkinson, wrote Australia's first children's book. Pretty amazing historical connection!

Here's my review of Bitter Greens. 

A S Byatt and Margaret Drabble - Whilst these two are sisters, they were estranged for many years .A S Byatt is best known for the book Possession and the book I remember reading from Margaret Drabble is The Red Queen. Here is my review.

Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte - It feels like it would be wrong to have a list of literary sister authors and not include the Brontes who have give us books like Jane Eyre, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and Agnes Grey. They also published a book of poetry under the names of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell

Do you know of any other famous authors who are sisters?