Video Series: Book Chats

Anna Ciddor is an author and illustrator who has made her name as a versatile writer and illustrator of fiction, travel and historical books for primary school children and older readers. Her Viking Magic historical fantasy series has earned her fans throughout the world. Anna is a patron for OZ Kids, an organisation that promotes and supports children’s literary and artistic talents and a 2021 Ambassador for Australian readers.

In her book chat, Anna discusses The Boy Who Stepped Through Time, her time-slip adventure about a boy transported back 1700 years to Roman times. She explores the complexity — and tremendous fun! — of weaving plot, character development and historical fact into her work.

Professor Danielle Celermajer is a philosopher, and Professor of Sociology and Social Policy at the University of Sydney. Her books include Sins of the Nation and the Ritual of Apology and The Prevention of Torture: An Ecological Approach. While her professional and academic background have focused on human rights, she has recently shifted her thinking and activism towards environmental, animal and human ethics and justice issues.

She lives in a Multispecies Justice Community in rural New South Wales and experienced first-hand the realities of climate change during the Black Summer Fires of 2019-2020. In this book chat on Summertime, a work of non-fiction written in the shadow of the 2019/2020 bushfires, Professor Celermajer expands on the story of Jimmy the pig, urging us to expand our understanding of grief beyond the anthropocentric — and discusses how she uses the evocation of sense in her work to take the reader beyond abstract knowledge of the natural world.