AustLit

'A beautifully presented and uplifting book of contemplative, wry, sometimes funny essays about living thoughtfully and with care amidst life's challenges. If you're struggling to maintain grace and good humour amidst daily potholes and pitfalls, Brigid Lowry may be just the warm, wise and witty companion you need. Informed by contemporary psychology and Zen Buddhism, Brigid's essays offer reflections on everything from friendship to grief, and from gratitude to self-care. Give this book to a friend or gift it to yourself, A Year of Loving Kindness to Myself is all the encouragement you'll need to nurture you and those around you.'(Publication summary)

'The good thing about being my age is that if you haven’t grown up already, you don’t have to. What do you do when you start talking to yourself on the bus? If you’re the writer Brigid Lowry, you change tack and write a book about what it means to be an ageing woman in the 21st century.

'In Still Life with Teapot Lowry offers advice, observations, hope and reality checks in equal measure. She drops us straight into the writer’s world – into the nuts and bolts of writing practice and into the art of life and ways to write about it.

Still Life with Teapot is an essential brew for people who love to make lists, for people who love to write and for people who love to read about writing.' (Publication summary)

'The Writer begins with a sparkly good idea for a fabulous fairytale. A girl called Glory is sent to work in the Royal Palace, where the queen is planning a grand ball and a bad-tempered princess is sorting through jewels and tiaras. And, unknown to Glory, the threads of her destiny are coming together.

'Nova is reading the fairytale. Fairytales are not usually her thing, but right now she's feeling a bit messy and lost. Her best friend has gone away and bitchy Dylan is hassling her. Still, Nova is curious to find out why Glory's mother is scrabbling under the bed for an old magic book.

'Can the Writer make everything turn out happily ever after? Will the princess find true love? Will Glory escape a secret curse? And can Nova smooth out the lumps and bumps in her life?' (From the publisher's website.)

'Life isn't neat and tidy. It's like a whole lot of balls of brightly colored wool thrown in a basket, with stray beginnings and endings and possibilities everywhere. Let's follow the blue.

'Fifteen-year-old Bec has always been the good girl. Growing up with an eccentric celebrity chef mother and a father who suffers from depression, Bec is used to taking care of her two younger siblings and being labeled "the sensible one." But when Bec's parents decide to take a six-week tour of the U.S., she decides that she is sick of being responsible and is ready for some adventures of her own. She meets a new friend named Jaz, dyes her hair, wins money, throws her first party, and then there's the boy thing...

'In this intoxicating novel by award-winning author and poet Brigid Lowry, Bec realizes that maybe she isn't so ordinary after all—and that sometimes it doesn't hurt to, as her mother would say, "lighten up and enjoy the ride."'

Source: Publisher's blurb.