This eerie tale will keep the reader intrigued long after finishing the book. In the town of Preston, an old rusting water tower stands on the edge of a hill. Two boys decide to go inside for a swim on a sweltering summer day. What happens inside is a mystery, but one of the boys is forever changed.

This 1995 Australian Picture Book of the Year winner uses the contrast between colorful illustrations and black background to great effect. In a twist on the usual picture book, the illustrations tell the real story, while the text provides the background information.

What a great puzzle. This is the kind of book that I could not stop thinking about, even long after I read it. This is an engaging book for adults as well as for children.

This book has kept the students in my grade 4/5 class at Acton School in Burnie, Tasmania captivated throughout this whole week. At first when I read it to them they picked up that the town residents eyes were funny looking but on further investigation they found many other peculiarities in the story. They were crowding around the book trying to see the different pictures and solve the mystery.

Erin says her favourite part was when Bubba came out of the tank and Spike wants him to show him his hand. Bubba says "No" because his mum would be worried however at the beginning he says that his mum would not care!

Alaster says that his favourite part of the book is solving all the mysteries.

Laura says her favourite part of the book was the picture of Bubba's face up close.

Melissa Lowry agrees with Erin that the part where Bubba came out of the Watertower is her favourite. Actually most of the class agrees that this part was the best. I think this is because it began all the questioning about the story.

Aaron and Matthew say that the mystery is related to the pitchfork that is seen on all pages.

We will be continuing to use Gary Crew books for language and drama work. We would love to hear from any one who has solved the mysteries in the story or of any activities you have been doing in the classroom. Thanks. .............

I have always been a fan of gary's and i was lucky enough to meet him. i was in one of his workshops on writing and i found him to be truly amazing.The Watertower, was a book we read in book club with older readers, and we found it intreging. It was easy to read the story, but as soon as you saw the subliminal messages in the illustrations, it was hard to focus your concerntration on the actual text. Don't shrug it off if you have that poor attitude about picture books.

The search for the mystical Wazo bird leads the main characters, Mala, Simon and Muir, in a quest that listeners will marvel at. The puzzling clues that lead them in their search see them go in circles stumbling upon countless obstacles and weird characters. Will they ever reach the home of the magnificent Wazo bird?

A good story for those who like a good mystery.

First Light won the Australian Children's Book of the Year Award Picturebook category in 1994, but it isn't a book for small children. Gary Crew excels at writing eerie stories for boys.

A boy, perhaps in his early teens, enjoys working on models. But his father, who got out more when *he* was young, believes that what he needs is to go out fishing on the bay before first light.

There are stranger things in the bay than either of them know, and through their experience they learn both awe and to understand each other a little better.

Peter Gouldthorpe's large illustrations are magnificent and evocative, showing scenes above and below the waterline.

Gary Crew once again grabs at the emotions of the reader as a boy comes to terms with the death of his sister. Beautiful illustrations enhance the feel of the book and draw the reader into the scene. The contrast of the pictures with the text, one presenting a scene of tranquility and safeness, the other presenting the story of loss and pain make this a memorable read.

I was aloft one day in the park while a naked indian rubbed my inner thighs as i began to recite a poem by Wilfred Owens. The naked indian or Mr. Anthony as i called him when i was younger, began to cry un controllably as i read verse after verse. I removed my shoes and started to clobber Mr. Anthony to death with them. He died a noble death fightin for his country and making butterscotch with only his short and curlies and left nipple. The End. I love you.

A very short picture book, but one with an emotional thread tapped by both the author and illustrator. Suitable for adults as well as children. Its only fault is that it is perhaps too short.

A statue to commemorate one war is uprooted by a tree planted to commemorate another. When the tree is cut down by the council, it deeply affects a family whose own roots lay in both conflicts.

Shaun Tan's illustrations are amazing and in comparisson to 'The Rabbits' show an incredible diversity in his work. Like The Rabbits, the illustrations in this book are powerful and emotional, full of texture and detail. If you are Australian or have been there, you will recognise the shapes, colours and sense of light. If you aren't from those parts, you will be taken on a ourney of even richer discovery.

Add it to a collection of Shaun Tan illustrated works and your appreciation will be even richer.

An inspiration for art exploration, Shaun Tan creates wonderful montages and collages that carry a message to enrich and extend the text. This is a fine book from Australia, honouring the soldiers who fell and the memorials that were built for them, illustrating the threads of oral history that are passed through a family, and questioning "progress" and modern convenience in the town planning processes. Excellent material as social Studies and the Language Arts overlap and complement each other.

Whether you enjoy this novel really all depends on your taste of books. If you're the one for sci-fi or adventure, this book is a little slow moving. However, if you like crime mysteries, this one is for you. Set in the small country town of Jericho, the Marriot family's life in fairly uneventful. That is, until a gold-miner who was recently seen around the area dies by mysterious means. The concern of the town is that, there are claims that he had two children around with him at the time. Their whereabouts is unknown. The story's ability to mix trivial events along with the highlights is extremely clever.

The Race to the Wild Children
By Aubry Jones

A boy named Kimmy lives in Jericho, Australia with his sister, Julia, his mother, and his father. His father is a doctor whose office is at his house. Once, a man named Flannagan had come to his father's office because his arm needed stitches. A few weeks later, Flannagan was murdered. Flannagan had two children who had been missing ever since their father's death. They were "wild children" who went to people's houses at night and stole chicken eggs. While stealing chicken eggs once, the girl, Leena, was caught. She stayed at Kimmy's house while everyone tried to figure out what to do with her. During this time, Kimmy got to know and talk to Leena. She told him where her brother was. One day, Kimmy and his friend decided to go and look for Leena's brother. He lived up at the North Arm in bat caves. They went searching in the blackness of the night and found something very important. I really enjoyed reading this book. It was very exciting and suspenseful. This book had many intricate details that gave lots of feeling to the story. Though this book got confusing at times, it is one of the best books I've ever read.

Lost Found and Murdered
Who killed Flannagan and where are his two kids? Flannagan, a guy that not many people know is murdered one night but when the scene of the crime (his campsite) is searched there are no signs of his kids. After many complaints from farmers, of eggs and milk being stolen, the girl is found and captured but her brother gets away. After a long time of searching her brother is found, but they would not tell who the murder was. However, after an argument between three adults he cannot hold it in any longer and tells them who killed his father, who could it be? I enjoyed reading this book, I don't think there was one minute that I was bored, it kept you guessing and wondering what could be next. Then the murder is thrown in and all thoughts of who the murder is are crushed. You will not be able to put the book. It is truly the most interesting book I have read all year.

'The figures of Julian Ashcroft' is a really great picture book for older readers. It explores issues about making choices and how we can let fate rule our lives. It has a solid, mysterious storyline that really captivates the reader. A fantastic book, well done Gary!

Strange Objects is written by Gary Crew and published in 1991 by Mammoth Australia.

Have you ever wondered about the past and its influences on present life? And what happens when you suddenly bring the dead back to life? These and more are the questions your head will be filled with when reading this fantastic novel by Gary Crew. Crew's other novel bestsellers include The Inner Circle and Angel's Gate, and his creative and original approach will leave the reader thinking long before the last line has been read.

Strange Objects is about a boy named Steven Messenger who lives in the remoteness of the midway on Highway One - 25 kilometres south of Hamelin. Other characters inlcude Charlie Sunrise, Jan Pelgrom, and Nigel Kratzman. One day on a school Biology trip, quite by accident, Messenger discovers a pot containing a journal of survivor Wouter Loos of the Dutch shipwreck "Batavia" that struck rocks off the Western Australian coast in 1629, and a mummified human hand with a ring. Four months later Messenger disappears. Somehow, all these characters and events are linked, but how? Readers will be left with many questions - How was Messenger linked to the found items? Where did he go? What is the importance of this missing ring?
The somewhat difficult to follow plot seems fairly easy to understand, that is, until the last few chapters where it starts to get very strange indeed.... It could be described as keeping you in suspense, and very intriguing with a touch of craziness that is found only in very few people.

In this reviewer's opinion, Strange Objects is a somewhat scrambled tale, however through its open ended plots and questions left unanswered, one can see into a whole new dimension of themes. I think this is very cleverly done by Gary Crew and feel that his supremely talented ability has made this a book to remember, and shall keep me thinking for a long time after I have finished it. I must add however, that it bothered me somewhat about the lack of a distinct conclusion to a very open plotline.

Strange Objects is a spiritualistic and sometimes chilling tale that takes reader-text interpretation to a new level. This book is complex and at times confusing but at the same time is intriguing, gripping and original. It comes as no surprise that it was awarded the 1991 Australian children's book of the year.

Steven Messenger is a confused and empty teenager growing up in rural Australia. On a school Biology camp he stumbles upon mythical and sacred objects; an ancient, previously mummified human hand and a mysterious gold ring in an iron pot. These amazing discoveries soon become public knowledge and the question and fascination over the origin of these objects enthrals the public. Found too is a journal, dating back to the 17th Century, detailing the story of a criminal who survived banishment of a Dutch ship- the Batavia, which struck uncharted rocks off the Western Australian coast in 1629. Gary Crew uses multiple genres including Steven's personal journal, letters, newspaper articles, historical records and the publicly published journal of Wouter Loos, the survivor of the ship. Collectively these 'articles' slowly piece together the complex jigsaw surrounding the objects found and Steven's personal experiences, that take him closer and closer to the borderline of insanity as the story develops. Revealed too is the links the objects have with traditional Aboriginal culture and the mysterious native local, Charlie- a key figure in Steven's pursuits. What unfolds is a story that leaves an open interpretation for the reader- it is up to ones self to judge if this is fantasy, science fiction or indeed a second-hand account of actual events that unfolded.

This book will give you back, as much as you put in to it. Take a cynical and restricted outlook into this story and you too, like me, will be left no more than irritated and confused. In turn, hop on board Steven's twisted journey and the events that surround it and this book will leave you fascinated and begging for more.

Strange Objects, written by Gary Crew, is a very confusing book that tends to jump from genre to genre. Because of this, you have to be alert and in full thinking mode in order to link all of the texts and different genres together. There is much mystery from the first chapter of the book and it only gets more mysterious as the book progresses, introducing more questions and more confusion. You may think that the book is too hard to follow when you start to read it however if you are keen enough to read on, it gets much easier to follow the story line and the book itself. The story line will no doubt startle you when you try to categorise it as fiction, non-fiction, fantasy or science fiction since you will most probably not know if the events actually happened or not. The whole story line is worked around the historical event of the Batavia shipwreck that happened in 1629. Gary Crew has integrated many facts into the novel that can be verified as being non-fiction but there are many things that cannot be verified being fact so it is left for you to decide or to find out.

Steven Messenger is a teenager from rural Australia who stumbles across relics from the Batavia shipwreck in a cave during a school biology excursion. This relic contains crucial information about the past and has historical remains of people. A journal, which was written by one of the Batavia castaways, was found among the relics and is translated from Old Dutch into Modern English. Throughout the book, a parallel can be seen between events that happened in the Batavia castaways in 1629 and what is happening in the present and this also poses even more questions. Steven Messenger has possession of an important piece of the puzzle and he refuses to declare it to the professionals in the historical field. Steven finds the ring to have a power to change his dreams and to send him messages where he dreams about the past and other weird and wonderful things. Nigel Kratzman is Steven Messenger's neighbour and may even be his only friend and may be the only person who is willing to help Steven with what is happening around him.

This book is no doubt the kind of book that you have to be constantly thinking about how to piece together the information that is given to you and to sift out what is truth and what has been manipulated in some way or another. As another reader from Adelaide has mentioned in one of his reviews, 'You'll only get out of it, what you put into it!'

This bok described the problem but has few practical ideas

Modern piracy has a few rare case every one knows of the 1985 indent of the Achille Lauro case. But there have been other case to witch include hijacking and muder. A great book.