Six Degrees of Separation (Aug): From The Safekeep to Australian Poems to Read to the Very Young

 The meme is hosted by Books are My Favourite Best and is described thus: On the first Saturday of every month, a book is chosen as a starting point and linked to six other books to form a chain. Readers and bloggers are invited to join in by creating their own ‘chain’ leading from the selected book. Each person’s chain will look completely different. It doesn’t matter what the connection is or where it takes you – just take us on the journey with you.

This month we start with the 2025 Winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction: The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden.  

I read this very recently and you can read my review here. 

The book is described:

An exhilarating tale of twisted desire, histories and homes, and the unexpected shape of revenge – for readers of Patricia Highsmith, Sarah Waters and Ian McEwan’s Atonement. It is fifteen years after the Second World War, and Isabel has built herself a solitary life of discipline and strict routine in her late mother’s country home, with not a fork or a word out of place. But all is upended when her brother Louis delivers his graceless new girlfriend, Eva, at Isabel’s doorstep – as a guest, there to stay for the season… In the sweltering heat of summer, Isabel’s desperate need for control reaches boiling point. What happens between the two women leads to a revelation which threatens to unravel all she has ever known.

First stop: Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. I've chosen a classic gothic novel here. The unnamed second Mrs. de Winter arrives at Manderley and is haunted (metaphorically) by the presence of Rebecca. This is perhaps my favourite book. Like The Safekeep, it's about a woman’s identity blurring and a house filled with heavy memories. My review. 

Second stop: The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters. Another mystery unravelling in a British manor, this one falling into decay and, like The Safekeep, set after the war. A doctor becomes entangled with a family struggling with a perceived haunting. My review.

Third stop: The Secret River by Kate Grenville. I'm not quite sure why this one came to mind next. It brings us to early Australian invasion history, where a man stakes a riverbank and builds a life on stolen lands. I think perhaps it's the wilful ignorance and moral consequences of theft that connects the books in my mind. There is definitely a common theme of moral reckoning across history. My review.

Fourth stop: The Timeless Land by Eleanor Dark. The Timeless Land expands the scope to a broader historical setting. While The Secret River offers an intimate perspective on one family’s journey, Dark’s novel provides a sweeping account of the first years of British invasion from multiple viewpoints, including the Aboriginal peoples. Like Grenville, Dark grapples with the complex legacies of settlement and challenges the dominant narratives of Australian history. I was actually interviewed on Radio National about this book. My review. 

Fifth stop: Blinky Bill by Dorothy Wall. The Timeless Land holds a special place in my own history. It was my grandmother’s favourite book; one she treasured and reread many times. This personal connection leads me to Blinky Bill, another Australian classic, but from a very different angle. Blinky Bill is a children’s story centred on the adventures of a mischievous koala, embodying a playful and irreverent spirit of one type of Australian childhood. The copy I have belonged to my grandmother, linking these two books through family.

Sixth stop: Australian Poems to Read to the Very Young. From the whimsy of Blinky Bill, for me the chain naturally moves to Australian Poems to Read to the Very Young. This collection of poems is deeply embedded in my own childhood memories, and I can still recite many by heart. Like Blinky Bill, it evokes a sense of place and identity shaped by the landscape and language of Australia. Just reading one of these poems returns me to special moments in my childhood.

For good measure, click here to see what in read in July.