Bundanoon author Jill Lovett published her first book, The Peppercorn Tree: Growing Up in post Second World War Sydney Suburbia, in 2018 on her eightieth birthday.
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The Peppercorn Tree is an autobiographical memoir which traces Jill's life growing up in Sydney throughout the 1940s and 1950s.
Ms Lovett used the analogy of a hardy Peppercorn tree, which survived in her childhood back yard, to symbolise the endurance of suburban battlers who struggled to achieve purpose and hope after the Second World War.
Ms Lovett said she had a large family and wanted to leave something for them.
"I thought to myself 'I am going to have a go writing about my life as a child growing up in suburbia'," she said.
"It all came together as I became older."
The book reveals a very different world of post Second World War frugality with a strong British style of education and no television or computers.
Ms Lovett said it was a time when children largely created their own entertainment and were expected to conform and obey all authority figures and accept limitations for their personal development and dreams.
The final chapters reveal how Jill's childhood impacted on her later life as a mother of six children, a victim of a difficult marriage and her eventual achievement of four university degrees as a mature-age student.
Jill also touches on aspects of Australian literature and how some of the greatest authors such as historian Manning Clark, novelist Patrick White and social scientists Donald Horne and John Thornhill have viewed suburbia and the Australian psyche developed over two centuries of pioneering our beautiful but harsh land.
Jill's story includes humour and pathos and is an observant record of the Australian suburban culture of the era.
Jill said this was a book for all who lived, dreamt and struggled in suburbia.
The Peppercorn Tree can be purchased from Berkelouw's Book Barn, 3020 Old Hume Highway, Berrima or through Jill Lovett at jill.lovett1@bigpond.com or 4883 6973.
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