Fiction (novel, short story)
One photo
Penguin Group
2016
Appears in NTRO Research Collection
Abstract
Dad came home one day with one of those old cameras, the kind that use film. But Dad didn't take photos of the regular things people photograph.
Research Background
Alzheimer’s Australia states that 413,106 Australians currently live with dementia, a subject matter that features in a range of picture books, notably Wilfred Gordon McDonald Partridge (1984), Still My Grandma (2006), When I See Grandma (2014), Really and Truly (2014), Celia and Nanna (2015), Grandad’s Island (2015) and Harry Helps Grandpa Remember (2015). As these titles indicate, the literature available focuses exclusively on dementia in grandparents. This limited representation erases children’s lived experiences of younger onset dementia, currently affecting 25,938 Australian families. The challenge in writing One Photo (Penguin Random House 2016) was to redress this gap in literature.
Research Contribution
One Photo is a picture book that portrays younger onset dementia in a parent. Told from the perspective of a boy whose father has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, the boy bears witness to his father’s disintegrating mental condition and uncharacteristic behaviour. In this way, One Photo is empathetic to the confusion felt by children living with parents with dementia, and provokes discussion with adult facilitators.
Research Significance
One Photo was shortlisted for the 2017 Children’s Book Council of Australia Picture Book of the Year. It received reviews in industry, educational and commercial publications, including Books+Publishing, Magpies, SCAN, Readings and Australian Women’s Weekly. Subsidiary Rights have been purchased for hardback publication in China (TB Publishing), and hardback and ebook editions in the USA and Canada (Candlewick Press). Broadcast Rights have been purchased by Story Box Library for a non-dramatic reading in the English language.
Details
- Title
- One photo
- Authors
- Ross Watkins (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Arts, Business and LawLiz Anelli (Illustrator)
- Publisher
- Penguin Group
- Date published
- 2016
- ISBN
- 9780670077977
- Organisation Unit
- School of Business and Creative Industries; School of Creative Industries - Legacy
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99450706002621
- Output Type
- Fiction (novel, short story)
- NTRO Classification
- NT2
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