When Mary Anne O’Connor’s heroine Junie Wallace gazes from the balcony of her family’s property over the hills of Braidwood, the view she sees is not imagined, but is based on the author’s own experiences of the area.
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O’Connor’s grandparents moved from Sydney to Braidwood during the Great Depression and eked out a living on a property in Mongarlowe, in a shack built by her Da, surviving on rabbits and gold dust.
I'm trying to keep this golden generation alive.
- Mary Anne O'Connor
O’Connor has dedicated the novel, Worth Fighting For, to her beloved aunts and uncles, many of whom’s children still live in the area. She based the main character on an uncle Jack Clancy, who was part of an secret elite unit of young fighters who trained in Sydney’s West. She was further inspired by her ant Iris Corby, who lived in Braidwood for many years, running a bed and breakfast in the Doncaster Inn.
Despite the hard times they experienced, Iris lost her first husband in WWII while seven months pregnant, O’Connor says these men and women stayed positive, made their own fun and worked hard.
O’Connor has said that in writing about her aunts and uncles who survived depression and war, she is, “trying to keep this golden generation alive”.
This is a second novel for O’Connor, whose first novel was published in 2015. Worth Fighting For is available at all major retailers.
