The Visitors

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I really enjoyed the characterisation, especially the “band of brothers” at Esperance: Gilbert, Sebastian, Clarrie, Rory and Hal. Such a lovely community of friends that have become a family for each other. The communal scenes with them all around the dinner table are just delightful. It is 1788 and some strange "canoes" appear at sea. A meeting of the elders of the seven local indigenous clans is called and the men or their representatives meet to discuss how they should respond. They share memories from previous generations who experienced a visit from these aliens. A decision must be made by consensus and the seven men waiver in what the best response should be. As the meeting progresses more and more of the "canoes" appear until there are 11 in total and one small canoe is launched and heads towards the shore. Crispin's adaptation of the original miniseries without any of the chapters that originally covered The Final Battle. In their place is a short work by Johnson linking this new version of the book to The Second Generation. After losing Alec, Esme is trying to find where she belongs. She’s gone from budding journalist to wife, then a gardener during the war, to widow and housekeeper. And housekeeper isn’t the role she’s been educated for … A good ghost story is hard to find, and a truly chilling contemporary ghost story near impossible. Ironically, in Michelle de Krester’s Springtime: A Ghost Story (Allen and Unwin, 2014), a character explains that we are, in fact, post-ghost:

The story involves a tragedy; there is a violent history. There are shades, and suggested ghosts, and although the ending is not very original - in fact it has echoes of many classic ghost stories - it is quite creepy and the whole is quite well played out as an exercise in tension. Part of Sydney Opera House’s 50th anniversary program and co-produced by STC and Moogahlin Performing Arts, The Visitors is a riveting, deeply researched insight into one of the most impactful and painful days in Australia’s history. Caroline Scott has done it again!! Created a storyline and characters that captivate and affect you emotionally as you connect with their plight and watch the drama unfold as they try to make sense of the world, and do their best to move on.I’m so glad I took the time yesterday to go to the headland above Farm Cove to read this book, to immerse myself in the area near where this story was set.

Marion and John are middle-aged siblings still living together in the home where they grew up. Their parents gone. Their neighbors highly suspicious. Of what? Could there possibly be something “creepy” going on in there? The most exciting debut in 2023, The Visitors is an audacious, earthy, funny, gritty and powerful re-imagining of a crucial moment in Australia's history - an unputdownable work of fiction.Thoughtfully written, and meticulously researched, detailed aspects of the war come through in poignant snippets of a memoir written by Rory, a gentle soul, whose trauma runs deep and whose burgeoning friendship with Esme is sensitively expressed. Esme herself is quietly introspective, her sense of loss is palpable and yet, when needed, she shows such utter strength of character that it quite broke my heart to see her diminished by a set of circumstances she could never have imagined.

Esme Nicholls like so many women of her generation, lost her husband Alec in The Great War and she’s being mourning him for years. As time goes by, she tries to hold on to the precious memories she shared with Alec, and they only had seven months together when he marched off to war. Based on a true story of discovery, The Visitors is New York Times bestselling author Sally Beauman's brilliant recreation of the hunt for Tutankhamun's tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings - a dazzling blend of fact and fiction that brings to life a lost world of exploration, adventure, and danger, and the audacious men willing to sacrifice everything to find a lost treasure. After its Sydney Theatre Award-winning premiere at the 2020 Sydney Festival, Muruwari playwright Jane Harrison’s The Visitors will be reworked for this brand-new production directed by one of Australia’s most celebrated directors, Quandamooka man Wesley Enoch. An incredible cast featuring Tiwi and Arrernte actor Joseph Wunujaka Althouse; Wiradjuri actor Luke Carroll; Yankunytjatjara, Warrigmal and South Sea Islander actor Elaine Crombie; Noongar, Budmiya and Watjari actor Kyle Morrison, Eastern Arrernte and Arabana actor Aaron Pedersen; Wiradjuri and Gamilaraay actor Beau Dean Riley Smith; Biripi actor Guy Simon, and Gumbaynggirr and Wiradjuri actor Dalara Williams, will bring to life this hugely entertaining study of how communities respond to change and the unknown. The Visitors by Jane Harrison is based on her successful play of the same name - therefore it is written with a play-like structure in parts. Inspired by the film, ‘ 12 Angry Men’, Jane has certainly done her research into one of the most impactful and ultimately painful days in Australian history. In just under 300 words, Jane successfully imagines what could have been senior leaders from the local tribes watching and arguing over the arrival of the First Fleet into Botany Bay in 1788. This is a reimagining of first encounters from an Indigenous perspective and it is truly something every Australian should be reading. All of the stories have a common thread, though I can't say what it is for fear of giving too much away. They are all eerie, suspenseful, and give you a feeling of dread as you read them. They will also keep you guessing until the very end.V spun off a series of original novels. Five were originally planned but the range soon extended beyond these. The first was a novelization of the first two miniseries combined into one story, originally planned as 2 books, Pinnacle later changed its mind during its writing, and decreed that it should be one book (The publishers were then left with the option of another book, this became East Coast Crisis) Because the Writers' Guide was not ready in time for the authors to consult, most of the original novels that followed did not feature characters or continuing storylines from the TV series, but rather focused on battles against the alien invaders in other parts of the world, some were also set during the "unrecorded year" between the end of "The Final Battle" and "Liberation day" to get around this problem.