BCL Books - Local Books - Adelaide & SA

Local Books - Adelaide & South Australia

It's always fun reading books from your local area - there's a familiarity to the people and the places that can make the books even more enjoyable. It's also interesting when travelling to read books set in or about the places you're visiting - just keep in mind most of them are fiction.

Below are local books for Adelaide and South Australia including Autobiographies / Biographies, books for Children and Young Adults, Historical books (books set in or written pre-1940s) and Contemporary books.
 

Autobiography / Biography

• From the Ground Up - by Alan Hickinbotham - Autobiography of the South Australian businessman who made it big in the building and wine industries.
   
• Gillen's First Diary 1875 - by Robert S Gillen - Journal of Robert Gillen as he travelled from Adelaide to Alice Springs to work on the Overland Telegraph Line.
   
• Goodbye to the City of Dreams - by Ivor Francis - Autobiography of the artist, art critic, and art director who grew up in Adelaide.
   
• Mailman of the Birdsville Track - by Kristin Weidenbach - Biography of Tom Kruse who worked as a mailman between the 1940s and 1960s, travelling along the Birdsville Track to deliver mail.
   
• Margaret Preston - by Deborah Edwards - Biography of the artist Margaret Preston who was born in Adelaide in the 1890s.
   
• The Dressmaker's Daughter - by Kate Llewellyn - Autobiography of the writer Kate Llewellyn about her years of nursing, life in bohemian Adelaide in the 1960s and 1970s, and becoming a writer.
   

Children / Young Adult

• Jetty Road - by Rebecca Burton - Novel written by Adelaide author about three young girls whose lives change when one develops an eating disorder. Lower secondary school and older.
   
• Our Enemy, My Friend - by Jenny Blackman - Set in 1915 in the Adelaide Hills, this children's novel tells the story of a small town struggling to deal with the ramifications of the war. Aimed at upper primary school students.
   
• Storm Boy - by Colin Thiele - Children's novel set in the Coorong region about a boy, his father, an outcast Aboriginal man, and an orphaned pelican called Mr Percival. Published in 1963. Mid-primary school and older.
   

Historical Fiction & Non-Fiction

• Dreamers and Visionaries - by Thelma Afford - Non-fiction book about the amateur theatres of Adelaide between the 1920s and the 1940s.
   

Contemporary Fiction & Non-Fiction

• In the Garden - by Miriel Lenore - Poetry collection focusing on the Adelaide Botanic Gardens.
   
• The Market - by Catherine Murphy & Rosa Matto - The stories, history, photographs, and recipes associated with the Adelaide Central Market.
   

More Local Books

• Brisbane and Queensland
• Darwin and the Northern Territory
• Hobart and Tasmania
• Melbourne and Victoria
• Perth and Western Australia
• Sydney, Canberra, and New South Wales