Book Review for GSM ECU Student Guild Magazine. (2011) by Susanne Lorraine Harford.

Book: Sam, Grace and the Shipwreck
Author: Michelle Gillespie
Illustrated by: Sonia Martinez
Published: 2011
Michelle Gillespie’s Sam, Grace and the Shipwreck is a classic Ripping Yarn children’s book, the true tale of an admirable, unselfish act of public virtue which earned the dashing hero and heroine each a handsome reward. In this era of fragmenting societies and cultures it is a valuable tool for children to learn key cultural ideas fundamental to the Australian way of life; to generously assist anyone in need and treat thy neighbour as thyself.
A real adventure book, the illustrations are exciting and full of movement, and the book demonstrates how powerful and productive a sympathetic relationship between man and beast can be. Two dashing horses that also star in the story are beautifully illustrated.
However, this is a teaching tool and many important, key factors are left unspoken. The true context of the hero is absent; what is the name of his tribe? Where is his traditional land? Even his name – Sam Isaacs – thoroughly European, gives the reader no clue.
There are no images of how his people lived in humpies made of sticks and bark, yet the life of the heroine is richly described and illustrated. Tragically the story does not explain a grant of 100 acres of freehold land to an Aboriginal, by the whites who had colonised his land, was a phenomenal exception to the policies of exclusion implacably hindering his race?
Hopefully this important information will be available at the month-long exhibition at the State Library of Western Australia, beginning 13 October, 2011.

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