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Blogs/Web Pages/Articles Literary Hub Liz Moore 2016 Liz Moore writes about her attraction to having orphan characters in her fiction. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience The Nowhere Child Christian White 2018 The Nowhere Child (2018) is Australian writer Christian White's award winning debut novel. At the centre of the story is Melbourne woman and photographer, Kimberly Leamy, who at the opening of the story is told that she is Sammy Went, a child who was kidnapped 28 years earlier. Kimberly travels to the US to solve the mystery of why she ended up in Melbourne and along the way encounters snake wielding religious fantatics. External Website

Authors V Homecoming: Volume 1 ➝ Back to Top

News - broadcast, print, internet, magazine articles The love that helped me beat hell of foster care Paul Barber (actor) 2007 Peter Grant talks to Liverpool actor Paul Barber about the highs and lows of his young life He became one of the nation’s favourite TV characters as Denzil in Only Fools and Horses. But Liverpool actor Paul Barber’s early life was blighted by a childhood spent in a succession of children’s homes and foster families. External Website

Radio & Podcast Malik and Mark Descendants 2021 In the first half of this episode, Care Experienced poet and performer, Malik Al Nasir talks about his journey to Guyana and finding family members, and his tracing his heritage back to both slave owners and to slaves. External Website

Films/Videos Motherless Children 2019 Motherless Children performed by Eric Clapton. Producer: Tom Dowd Arranger, Work Arranger: Carl Radle Arranger, Work Arranger: Eric Clapton Composer Lyricist: Blind Willie Johnson. External Website

Authors B Why Richard Kingsmill is is My God ➝ In My Own Time: Almost an Autobiography ➝ No Boys Play Here: A story of Shakespear & My Family's Missing Men ➝ Not Forgotten ➝ Your Honour Can I Tell You My Story? ➝ Choice or Constraint in Everyday Life ➝ Little Big Man ➝ Foster Kid ➝ Girl with dove: a life built by books ➝ Daffodils - Audiobook ➝ Sunday's Child? - a Memoir ➝ Racial Folly ➝ Through the Eyes of a Foster Child: My Childhood in Over 30 New Zealand Homes ➝ Childhood: A Memoir ➝ Only: A singular memoir ➝ The Green Lady: A Spirit, A Story, A Place ➝ Aboriginal women by degrees : their stories of the journey towards academic achievement ➝ Lion: A Long Way Home ➝ Not without You ➝ The Child She Bare ➝ Better Off in a Home ➝ Back to Top

Fiction featuring Care Experience Frankie Graham Norton 2024 Frankie (2024) by Irish comedian and television host, Graham Norton, tells the story of Frankie Powell. Frankie is being cared for by Damian in her small London flat. Damian listens as Frankie tells the story of her life which includes being orphaned at the age 11 and running off to London as soon as she can. The narrative travels from post-war Ireland to 1960s New York & reveals Frankie’s resilience & endurance. External Website

Authors N Bandmaster and academic ➝ Musician, actor, activist ➝ Back to Top

Television Shows Clickbait 2021 This American-Australian is a thriller revolving around the mystery of who first kidnapped physiotherapist, Nick Brewer, and who then killed him. Episode 6 'The Brother' is the story of a grieving man whose sister, feeling rejected by an online lover, has killed herself. Viewers are told that the pair grew up in the foster care system, but that detail is irrevelant to the story. External Website

Writers Regina Calcaterra 1966- Regina M. Calcaterra (born 1966) was in and out of foster care as a child and she went on to write about her experiences in Etched in Sand: A True Story of Five Siblings Who Survived an Unspeakable Childhood on Long Island (2013). Regina is also an American attorney and a founding partner of Calcaterra Pollack LLP law firm. She served as Executive Director to two of New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo’s investigatory commissions, Chief Deputy to Suffolk County Executive Steven Bellone, and Deputy General Counsel to both the New York State Insurance Fund and New York City Employees’ Retirement System. External Website

Authors S What Mummies Are Made Of by Stephanie Hutton ➝ The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events) ➝ Heidi ➝ Dennis and the Big Decisions (2-5 years) ➝ The Leftovers ➝ Extraordinary Birds (8-12 years) ➝ Don't Ask The Dragon ➝ Jamberoo Road ➝ Ballet Shoes ➝ Back to Top

Authors B Terri Broughton ➝ Back to Top

Fiction featuring Care Experience Mansfield Park Jane Austen 1814 Jane Austen's 3rd novel, Mansfield Park (1814), is about a girl growing up in kinship care. Fanny Price is 10 when she is sent to live with a wealthy aunt and uncle. The Bertrams have 4 children, all older than Fanny. Only Fanny's cousin, Edmund, treat her kindly; her other cousins and aunt Norris are mean. Many readers find Fanny Price a difficult character to emphathise one; she's described by as "Jane Austen's least popular heroine." Tara Isabella Burton (2014) points out, however, that in reading Mansfield Park we need to pay attention to social class and how class privilege plays a key role in determining our expectations of what a 'good' heroine should be like. External Website

Radio & Podcast Adoption: The Making of Me Adoption: The Making of Me Adoption: The Making of Me is a podcast by 2 US-based adult adoptees, Sarah Reinhardt & Louise Browne. In the 1st episode of the podcast (30 April 2021), the focus is on Sarah’s adoption experience and in the 2nd episode, it is Louise’s turn. In subsequent episodes, the hosts talk to other adoptees as well as review material centred on adoption, eg The Primal Wound by Nancy Newton Verrier (Season 1). External Website

Autobiography/Memoir Ootlin Jenni Fagan 2024 Ootlin (2024) is the memoir of award-winning Scottish writer Jenni Fagan. Born in 1977, Jenni had something like 29 different ‘placements’ from birth until age 16, and even though she was ‘adopted’ twice and lived with the 2nd ‘adoptive’ home from the age of 5 until she attempted suicide at the age of 12. Despite an extraordinarily difficult childhood while in the Scottish ‘care’ system, Jenni did learn she could take refuge in reading and in writing. Jenni Fagan tells us at the beginning of Ootlin that her memoir began “as a suicide note” twenty years previously. Doing that writing “kept her alive” until she was ready to share her important story with the world. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Year of the Orphan Daniel Findlay 2017 Daniel Findlay’s speculative fiction young adult novel, Year of the Orphan (2017), is set in the harsh Australian Outback hundreds of years into the future. A girl, called Orphan and who was sold as a child, is being pursued across the desert by a feared being called The Reckoner. She carries secrets about the collapse of civilisation given to her by Old Man, who remembers the past. The Orphan is driven to understand the past as she sees that as the key to survival now. Will the Orphan save the only home she knows—as corrupt and greedy as it is—or will she decide for its destruction? External Website

Authors P Sancho: An Act of Rememberance ➝ Back to Top

Authors I Simone Biles becomes youngest living person to receive Presidential Medal of Freedom ➝ The One Percent compilation ➝ Back to Top

Radio & Podcast How Stephen sang himself to life Conversations (Stephen Smith) 2023 Australian opera singer Stephen Smith was in foster care as a child. He left school at 15 and was homeless for a time. At age 17, Stephen was working at a department store in Melbourne when a colleague suggested he take singing lessons. He went for an audition to the Victorian College of Arts, got himself a Bachelor of Arts, and toured the world as an opera singer for 20 years. You can hear more of Stephen’s incredible story on this Conversations podcast. External Website