Bluebird Cafe [Paperback]

Carmel Bird (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In Tasmania, successful entrepreneur Nancy Best has recreated the defunct mining town of Copperfield as a glass-domed amusement park whose centerpiece is the Bluebird Cafe. The facsimile also includes a wax museum containing a statue of Lovelygod, the midget daughter born to the twins Bedrock and Carrillo Mean, who caused a sensation when she vanished without a trace 20 years before. Bedrock faithfully keeps vigil for her daughter's return, while Carrillo roams the world in search of her. Also haunted by the mystery is expatriate author Virginia O'Day, who returns to Tasmania from America to write a play, Waiting for Lovelygod. Scattered through the carefree structure of this novel are eccentric characters set against glimpses of the stuffy British colonial life of the '50s and the vanished, magical Aboriginal culture. For good measure, the author has also included an assortment of recipes for oldtime confections. Bird ( Woodpecker Point & Other Stories ) captures a realm full of unexplained wonders, tenacious love, and tragedies for which there is no prevention and only limited recovery.

Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 180 pages
• Publisher: New Directions (May 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 081121155X
• ISBN-13: 978-0811211550
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,160,220 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Carmel Bird is an Australian novelist. Her novels include literary fiction, crime, and satire.
Titles include: Cherry Ripe; The Bluebird Cafe; Red Shoes; The White Garden; Cape Grimm; Unholy Writ; Open For Inspection; Crisis; Child of the Twilight.
She has also written five collections of short stories.
She has edited anthologies of Australian writing including The Stolen Children Their Stories and The Penguin Century of Australian Stories.
Her books on the craft of writing are: Dear Writer; Not Now Jack I'm Writing a Novel; Writing the Story of Your Life.

Her new novel due from HarperCollins in 2010 is The Child of the Twilight.
Also in 2010 her anthology of Australian writers on the idea of home will be published.
The title is Home Truth.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A Newly Discovered Gem, October 23, 2009

By 

J. F. Roche (Lansing, MI United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Bluebird Cafe (Paperback)

What a delight! I have ordered enough favorites (and clunkers) from Amazon over the years that their recommendations are beginning to pay off. This is one that has. Carmel Bird is one of the most imaginative, amusing, off-beat, and deceptive authors I have come across in years. Whoda thunk there was a Tasmanian woman writing such exciting fiction? This novel is a melange of history, fantasy, comedy, tragedy, and mystery tied up with a neat little bow. While amusing and easy to digest, it offers much to ponder and admire. It's deceptively simple yet both challenging and entertaining. It's also a good place to start a course of enjoyment of this terrific author. Since reading this, I have read a book of short stories, 'Woodpecker Point', which is just as delightful and perhaps even more alarming (especially the title story), and a longer, darker novel, Cape Grimm, which takes place in the same neighborhood as 'Bluebird Cafe' and even features some of the same characters and myths. There is nothing better for a lover of literature than to happen upon a new and exciting voice (actually, Ms Bird is in her sixties now but she is new to me). Give her a chance and let me know what you think!

4.0 out of 5 stars Bluebird Cafe, May 13, 2004

By 

Sarah Sammis "Avid BookCrosser" (Hayward, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bluebird Cafe (Hardcover)

The Bluebird Café's protagonist is clearly the island state of Tasmania and the fictional city (original and recreation) of Copperfield--although it's the depiction of the real places of Tasmania that make this book so entertaining. It uses a disjointed narrative structure similar to Illywhacker and The Beautiful and the Damned but not as expertly. In this case, the unusual structure hinders an otherwise interesting story.