Showing results by narrator "Anna Hruby" in All Categories

Hallie, a young and successful fashion blogger, recently married to a station owner, is having trouble adjusting to the flies, dust, snakes and isolation in the Flinders Ranges. Left alone with her baby while her husband, Alex is often out on long bore runs during the day, she also has to contend with her father-in-law, Rod, who insists on making himself at home in their house. Alex is out on a bore run, and as Hallie and their daughter, Ruby, watch him in real time on the camera from the homestead, Alex suddenly disappears from view. He is found later, dead at the bottom of a windmill.

Nine years ago, 30-year-old Chelsea Taylor left the small country town of Barker to rise to the top as a concert pianist. Yet here she was, back again with her four-year-old daughter, Aria, readying herself to face her father, Tom. The father who'd shouted down the phone nine years ago never to come home again....

Framed by the turning of the seasons in her small suburban garden, Carol Lefevre's Bloomer documents the year in which she turned seventy. Memoir threads through meditations on aspects of ageing, from its hidden grief and potential for loneliness to our relationship with the past and with our own mortality.

When Brianna Donahue was three years old, her mother mysteriously disappeared while farming in Merriwell Bay, Western Australia. Now she works the same land while almost single-handedly raising her two children, and when her son goes missing she is forced to face the fact her marriage has huge cracks in it. Meanwhile, over 2,000 kilometres away in South Australia, Detective Dave Burrows sets off on an investigation that will impact Brianna’s world and test her relationships with those she loves most.

When Sassi Stapleton receives a middle-of-the-night phone call to tell her that her beloved grandmother is unwell, she quickly puts her job on hold, packs her ute and sets off on the long drive home, knowing her grandfather will need her. Less than an hour away from Sassi's hometown, Barker, she swerves to miss a roo and her car rolls down an embankment. By the time Sassi is found, her grandmother has already passed away.

Don’t let retirement just happen to you. Make it the retirement you want and deserve. Will you have enough money to enjoy your retirement? The No-Regrets Guide to Retirement is your definitive guide to making your later years your best years. Qualified financial planner Patricia Howard explains why retirement is a good news story in Australia and offers no-nonsense, upbeat advice to help get you to, and comfortably through, your retirement.

Penny McIntyre loves her life as an ambitious city professional, so when she's floored by a mystery illness and ordered back to the family farm for three months' rest and recuperation, she is horrified to find her perfect life imploding. Within days, she is forced to leave her job, her live-in boyfriend and her beloved city apartment...to return to the small country town in which she grew up. Back to her dad and three sisters, one of whom has never forgiven her for abandoning her family. And to her ex-boyfriend, Tim Patterson, who was the biggest reason she ran in the first place.

Mia, a newly graduated constable, on her first post is assigned to Broad River, a small country town. And as certain as she is about her ability to do the job, on day one she's already in conflict with colleagues who believe that women shouldn't be coppers. It takes the shine off coming home, where her grandmother, Clara, is in the early stages of dementia.

While scientists double down on the shocking figures, we still find ourselves unable to discuss climate change meaningfully among friends and neighbours - or even to grapple with it ourselves. The key to progress on climate change is in the psychology of human attitudes and our ability to change. Whether you're already alarmed and engaged with the issue, concerned but disengaged, a passive sceptic or an active denier, understanding our emotional reactions to climate change, is critical to coping on an individual level and convincing each other to act.

Fiona is devastated when her husband Charlie commits suicide after the accidental shooting of his friend. Though Fiona decides to keep farming their successful property, rumours that she intends to sell keep circulating. When Detective Burrows arrives to sign off on the investigation into Eddie's death, his suspicions are aroused by some strange anomalies at the scene. As Dave becomes increasingly convinced that something sinister is going on, Fiona finds herself dealing with disasters at the farm.

Between managing a bustling beauty salon, hectic volunteer commitments and the lion's share of parenting two-year-old Claudia, Angie McIntyre barely has time to turn around. And with each passing month, she feels her relationship with fly-in, fly-out boyfriend Rob Jones slipping through her fingers. When Rob faces retrenchment and the most fabulous fixer-upper comes onto the market, Angie knows this derelict weatherboard cottage will be the perfect project to draw their little family together.

Former social worker Elle Castillo is the host of a popular true-crime podcast that tackles cold cases of missing children in her hometown. After four seasons of successful investigations, Elle decides to tackle her white whale: the Countdown Killer, or TCK. Twenty years ago, TCK established a pattern of taking and ritualistically murdering girls, each a year younger than the last. No one’s ever known why - why he stopped abruptly with his 11-year-old victim, or why he followed the ritual at all.

In Shattered to Shining, nine women and one male domestic violence survivor describe how they were shattered, as their home became a place where physical and sexual violence, emotional and psychological control dominated their lives. Through persistence and courage, they have risen above their situation and come out the other side shining with positivity, strength, commitment, and empathy for others.

In Terror to Triumph, 12 domestic violence survivors describe the terror they experienced and the additional challenges they encountered from a system that was supposed to help them. Most importantly, they tell of the practical steps they have taken - physically, emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually - to journey from darkness to light and build new lives. They tell of continued recovery, and how they have reclaimed self to reach a sense of triumph.

Since inheriting Nambina, the property that's been in her family for generations, Laura Murphy has worked wonders. Rather than just focus on farming she has set up a successful school teaching women the basics of managing a property—from fencing and mustering to handling the financial side of the business. But the notoriously self-reliant Laura is lonely and still scarred by a tragedy from her past. She's also grappling with the hostility of her nearest neighbor and former best friend, Meghan Hunter. The fact that Laura's ex-boyfriend Josh is Meghan's brother only makes things worse.

Former social worker Elle Castillo is the host of a popular true-crime podcast that tackles cold cases of missing children in her hometown. After four seasons of successful investigations, Elle decides to tackle her white whale: the Countdown Killer, or TCK. Twenty years ago, TCK established a pattern of taking and ritualistically murdering girls, each a year younger than the last. No one’s ever known why - why he stopped abruptly with his 11-year-old victim, or why he followed the ritual at all.

On a hot October afternoon, a girl walks barefoot out of the Wimmera desert, near the small town of Gatyekarr. She finds sanctuary with Beth, a regenerative farmer and collector of seeds, devoted to bringing her family's farm back to life. The arrival of the mysterious 'desert girl' unsettles the community and old tensions erupt. The longer the girl stays silent, the more volatile the town becomes. Who is she and what does her presence mean?

Dumped by her husband of twenty-five years, Jo Peck—smart, successful, and sixty—is totally floored. There's the complete bombshell of the news, the cliché of a younger woman—a much younger woman—there's the disappointment of cancelled retirement travel plans, and there's the foundation-rocking loss of her sense of identity—if she's no longer Rex's wife, who the hell is she?

For most of his 76 years, Bill Smith preferred solitude over socialising, horses over people and confidentiality over confidantes. As a jockey, he was known for always turning up already fully kitted out in his silks. But now, in his advancing years, a fall lands him in full-time care and it becomes impossible to maintain his privacy. Nurse Maureen Bannon resents having to look after ‘the geries', especially grumpy old buggers like Mr Smith, but when she discovers Bill's secret an unlikely alliance is formed. Bill was assigned female at birth.

When 25-year-old journalist Zara Ellison receives her mother's ominous text message, 'Call me when you can', Zara knows it's not good news. Two weeks later, Zara has left her much-loved city life to relocate to Barker, the sleepy country town in which she grew up. For Zara, family comes first. But she needs to work too, and the town's police force is a rural journalist's best source of information. Meeting Detective Dave Burrows and Dave's second-in-charge, Senior Constable Jack Higgins, is a priority.