QUT Library staff are sharing some reads that make us Happy!
We hope you enjoy one more insight from QUT Library staff as we share our favourite reads and reading spots.
SALLY
“If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.”
– Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106-43 BCE.
I’m currently working as a Liaison Librarian to the Health Faculty. I assist researchers and teaching staff in using the library service, and develop the collection by purchasing books in my discipline areas. It is a great job, and very stimulating. However, life needs balance, and I get mine through working in my orchard at home. I have a quarter acre block with about 40 varieties of fruit and nuts on various trees, bushes, vines and plants- I lose track!
Growing fruit is much easier than growing vegetables, but you need longer to harvest the rewards. Even the long time-frames for growing fruit work well in balancing the hurried pace of academic life. I don’t often get time to read now that I have the orchard, but when I find a book with a fruit or orchard theme my curiosity is piqued.
“Mr Wigg” is a charming and gentle read with a nostalgic feel to it. Peaches feature quite a bit in this story. Here is the blurb from the back of the book:
It’s the summer of 1971, not far from the stone-fruit capital of New South Wales, where Mr Wigg lives on what is left of his family farm. Mrs Wigg has been gone a few years now and he thinks about her every day. He misses his daughter, too, and wonders when he’ll see her again. He spends his time working in the orchard, cooking and preserving his produce and, when it’s on, watching the cricket. It’s a full life. Things are changing though, with Australia and England playing a one-day match, and his new neighbours planting grapes for wine. His son is on at him to move into town but Mr Wigg has his fruit trees and his chooks to look after. His grandchildren visit often: to cook, eat and hear his stories. And there’s a special project he has to finish. Trouble is, it’s a lot of work for an old man with shaking hands, but he’ll give it a go, as he always has.
If you are interested in gardening, there is a community garden at the Kelvin Grove campus in Kundu Park, Blamey St.
Developing peach and flower in July 2020
Such pretty flowers!
QUT Library has books in the collection on – Fruit and vegetables in human nutrition, Kitchen gardens and Vegetable gardening
Hope you have enjoyed our ‘Happy Reads’ series as much as we did!
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