Books with author Elizabeth Madox Roberts

In "Our Little Canadian Cousin," my intention has been to tell, in a general way, although with a defined local setting, the story of Canadian home life. To Canadians, home life means not merely sitting at a huge fireplace, or brewing and baking in a wide country kitchen, or dancing of an evening, or teaching, or sewing; but it means the great outdoor life—sleighing, skating, snow-shoeing, hunting, canoeing, and, above all, "camping out"—the joys that belong to a vast, uncrowded country, where there is "room to play." This wide and beautiful Canadian Dominion possesses, of course, a great variety of climate and of scenery. To treat at all adequately of those things, or of the country’s picturesque and romantic history, would require far more scope than is afforded by this one small story.

Djamila's Dress is a "Young Adult" novel which traces the journey a 14 year old Jewish girl embarks upon after finding tissue paper covered with faint Arabic writing inserted in the folds of a Palestinian dress she has received as a gift. The story follows Eva's quest to translate the script, and to act upon the plea for help from the writer, Djamila, the Palestinian girl who sewed the dress. Eva encounters help and hindrance both at home and at school, and although the drama that unfolds touches on many large issues - such as the Israeli / Palestinian conflict, Australian anti-terrorism laws, racism, refugees and reconciliation - at the heart of this book is the story of a teenager discovering her own intellectual, ethical and moral capacities as she comes to terms with her father's death two years earlier, and as she teeters on the brink of adulthood.

Who wouldn’t answer a cry for help? But could you help someone whose people had killed your father? For Eva, born to an Australian-Jewish family with a heritage of pain and loss, right and wrong are turned inside out. A message arrives, hidden in the folds of a gift her uncle brings to Sydney from the Holy Land. It comes from East Jerusalem – home to the Arabs Eva’s family blames for her father’s murder. As Eva forges a relationship across the Israeli-Palestinian gulf, she finds herself struggling with consequences at home, where her family is on the brink of collapse. Eva looks to her oldest friends for support, but they turn against her. School, home, peers – all become a nightmare she can’t escape as rumours about her terrorism spread. But worse is on the way. When the police turn up it seems the wider community is siding against Eva in her quest to help a stranger in a far-off land. The world may be against her, but Eva won’t give in. Can she weather the rising storm, and rescue her new friend before fear and prejudice tear them apart forever?