Author(s): Edith Jessie Flanders

History

Edith Jessie Flanders has taken a small but important oral history that explains a significant part of the story of the much loved working dog, the Australian Kelpie, and placed it in context by researching the life of an Irish immigrant family. Her research about the Irish potato famine and the related transportation and assisted migration to the colonies, about the highs and lows of trying to make a new beginning in a harsh environment and about the ways that families had to come to terms with the new ways and new social order in their adopted land makes for lively and entertaining reading. His Own Man follows the family and the lurking curse that they find difficult to shake. The story spans three generations to fully explain the actions and motives of young Jack Gleeson, a good lad but one who was faced with temptations. This is a story men and women and their modest but heroic efforts as they pass through the convict system, the gold rushes and the difficulties of life in the Western District of Victoria.
The author's research, the oral history provided by her father-in-law, her many years of living in the area and her deep understanding of life on the land enable her to write a convincing historical novel that has been read with enthusiasm by many people.