The Lorikeet Tree by Paul Jennings

Title: The Lorikeet Tree

Author: Paul Jennings

Genre: Contemporary

Publisher: Allen and Unwin

Published: 31^st January 2023

Format: Paperback

Pages: 192

Price: $19.99

Synopsis: A sister and brother face the hardest year of their lives and discover the healing power of nature in this compelling tale from master storyteller Paul Jennings.

Emily loves the bush and the native animals on her family’s reforested property, particularly the beautiful rainbow lorikeets that nest in one of the tallest trees. But then her father is diagnosed with a terminal illness, and Emily’s world enters a tailspin.

Her twin brother, Alex, refuses to accept the truth. His coping mechanism is to build elaborate additions to his treehouse in the superstitious belief that it will avert disaster – leaving Emily to deal with harsh reality on her own.

When Alex secretly adopts a feral kitten, going against everything that’s important to Emily, the siblings’ emotions reach boiling point – with potentially dangerous consequences for them all.

A moving story of family, loss and love, from one of Australia’s most beloved storytellers.

~*~

Emily and Alex are twins, living on a rainforest property near Warrnambool on the Great Ocean Road. They’re fifteen and have been living alone with their father since their mother died when they were six. But as they’re going through their current school year, they have to tackle many obstacles: the feral kittens under their house and Alex’s determination to keep one, Emily always feeling like she’s taking care of Alex and putting his wants and needs ahead of everything else, and their dying father. Emily and Alex are butting heads – as Emily tries to get through school, taking care of the home, and taking care of herself, her father and Alex, all Alex is doing is hiding a feral kitten and building rooms out of matchboxes and in his treehouse in a tree that is filled with lorikeets. As Alex retreats into superstition to avoid disaster, he leaves his sister to try to deal with the realities of everything they are facing alone.

Paul Jennings is known for his funny books and creations – Round the Twist, Unreal, Uncanny, Gizmo, and many more that kids have loved since 1985. Yet in The Lorikeet Tree, he has diverged from his stories about the weird and wonderful and created a serious story about overcoming obstacles in a world where everything is unpredictable – a story that has a gravitas to it that his lighter stories may not always have had. During my childhood, we all knew Paul for his funny stories, the short stories he wrote alone and with authors like Morris Gleitzman, – the covers of which were always an indication of the strange, uncanny and completely bizarre worlds, characters and stories that were inside the covers, as well as television show Round the Twist -which was strange, scary and entertaining at the same time. These stories that were around during my childhood came amidst many unusual Australian shows and books, and are now known as classics and considered completely normal for us to have read. Yet in his latest novel, Paul has created a touching story about how different people navigate tragedy, obstacles, and impending end of life differently.

The story is told through Emily’s perspective – as she writes a memoir of her years as part of a Literature assignment, and each part is a season – Autumn, Winter, Spring, and Summer during the year her father is sick, and we see her grappling with his illness, saving the rainforest, and the fact that her brother has kept a kitten in the house, whose presence threatens the existence of the lorikeets. Simply told yet filled with heart, The Lorikeet Tree reflects the conflicts of siblings and parents and being part of a family facing tragedy and what that could mean for your future. I dabbled in Paul Jennings books at school, but I think this was the one that has connected with me the most. I think that is because whatever age we are, we always have challenges and obstacles we need to overcome, so I think this is one of Paul’s books that will have a broad appeal, and that will speak to many different readers.

The Lorikeet Tree also speaks for the environment and a place that cannot speak for itself, that is in conflict with what the characters want or are trying to do – where Alex wants a cat and refuses to see the dangers, the challenges of having Ditto in their lives – and of course, there are moments when everything comes to a head and it all falls on Emily’s shoulders to fix – Alex refuses to help, and only when he is forced to face reality, can he come to terms with what needs to be done – for his family and for Ditto. The lyrical feeling of this book captured my imagination and it is one that has a timeless feeling about it – and is one that I hope many people come to enjoy.