I am Mark, Guardian of Mawson Bear. Mawson is a big hearted, soul searching Writer-Bear. His little books are stuffed with moments of happiness for frazzled grownups.
Why not slow down and relax a while with Mawson's friends in their cosy, whimsical world. Refresh the soul in the tranquility of innocent hours and simple joys.
Slipping love between the floorboards, Catching stars as if they’re snow…
This book brings poetry to each page, including to the pages with no words. Perhaps by the twentieth read-through I may be able to summon words of my own sufficient to convey its lingering power. But I’m still looking at the story and illustrations together as presented. Then at the illustrations alone. Then the story alone.
In a world where their love is illegal, a young couple find a way to stay together — but one small moment could tear it all apart.
The haunting monochrome illustrations of this beautifully presented hardcover book could each stand framed on a wall. The style Makeshift Galaxy most brings to my mind is that of Shaun Tan. Like him, Turgoose uses both images with words, sometimes dispensing with words. What has happened? What does it all mean? That is left for each reader to mull over in their own way.
It has the look of a coffee table book,and be warned: when you return with the steaming cuppa you may find your guest with book open, oblivious of you and staring far away. Into another galaxy, perhaps.
‘The silence screamed with stories left untold.’
Makeshift Galaxy an illustrated story about love, sacrifice and survival, is published by Odyssey Books. It is stocked at major online retailers, including Book Depository, and Amazon. Its free to see on Kindle Unlimited but this is a book you will want for real, on your bookshelf.
It’s time. This list is all stuff that I either made (wrote/photographed) myself, or was made by someone I know. For Young Kids As you can perhaps guess based on the title, this book is designed for refugee and immigrant kids who are new to Australia. It will be published in English, Indonesian, Arabic, Spanish, […]
I have cat fever. It’s like hay fever but much more furry. Can it have anything to do with How to Survive Your Magical Family? Everywhere I look, there’s a cat. It’s quite spooky now that my cat book is here. Seems the neighbourhood cats know something. Maybe they sense me spending too much time […]
Did you know, Fellow Baffled Ones and Gentlebears, that you can leave reviews of books? You don’t have to be a formal reviewer, oh no. You can just plonk down what you think about a book. You can say a lot about it or say only a little. It would be so wonderful if you do some reviews. For every writer-bear.
You can do reviews for Mawson and his books, if you like. Just ask, and we’ll send you a PDF version to look at. OR, look for the books. Two of them are FREE to read on Kindle Unlimited.
Each review is wanted, Each review is good, Your review is welcome In a writer’s neighbourhood.
Why your help matters: In these days of (shudder) Algorithms all forms of recognition for a book matter. They are all noted. They all add up. All the Likes, the Shares, the Mentions, the Clicks on buttons that say ‘Helpful’- they all get taken into account by these (shudder) Algorithms. But the most helpful thing of all is a REVIEW.
YOUR review matters so much that I would send every reviewer a block of chocolate* if I could, smudged by tears of gratitude. Your review not only tells other purchasers of Grand Books about (cough) Mawson’s, but they also jump up the rankings of the book and the visibility of it and all that sort of thing.
It’s easy, really it is: Some reviews kindly given for It’s A Bright World To Feel Lost Inhave been only a line. Two lines. A few more lines. Click here to see examples, real reviews on Amazon dot Com.
Scotty plonks on the key board to do a few brief reviews of books.
It’s fun to have a bash: If you are stuck for something to say, simply bash away on the star ratings. They all get counted by those (shudder) algorithms. Here, our Sir Scotland The Brave shows how to stab most valiantly at the star ratings.
Click ‘Like’: While you are at these websites, you can also run your eye down the page to the reviews left by other fine people, and click on the ‘Helpful’ or ‘Like’ buttons beneath them. (This all helps with those pesky algorithms.
The awesome power of ‘playing’ on your device: So, every Share, Like and Mention on your social media helps; yes, the (shudder) algorithms note it all. Keep them coming and Mawson’s books( and the books of all writers who are not bears to) can keep bravely going out into the wide bright world.
Dear Friends. To rely on any one platform/service/outlet run by moguls/barons/billionaires is unwise. We have not put all our bears in one basket, oh no. You can find Me, Mark, the Guardian, and Mawson (he’s the furry one) all over this bright world including, of course, right here at WordPress.
Has everybody hit the road but us? Have all our peers contracted wanderlust? They scorn to pay A mortgage rate, From suburbs they Accelerate, And leave we Stay-At-Homers in their dust.
They ceased their dreary jobs, and left home.
Now down the endless open road they roam.
No plants to water,
Lawns to mow,
Caravans they'd rather tow.
The bonds of static life they've cut and thrown.
Seems many have converted bus or van.
Now they cruise like sailors on the land.
On highways, byways,
Road and track,
They rove - and they show
No regrets.
Oh, they go where they will
Just 'cause they can.
They've hurled away the ironing board and suit.
Of deadlines they no longer care a hoot.
They're tramping trails,
Pitching tents,
Fingers raised
To city rents,
Happy in their hiking packs and boots.
They've hit the road, Those Jacks and Jills. They range the plains And grind up hills, No longer merely cogs In the machine. Of their days They make the most, And they can claim the ringing boast, That everywhere we want to go - They've been!
Let's also go! Let's join the Nomads Grey. Why keep slogging on Each routine day, Why drive blood pressure Higher Until we fast Expire? Go! Rev up the RV And roar away.
P.S. Of course, we'd only take the bare necessities: Favourite pillow, laptops, Sixteen types of cheese, Communications, Medications, Satellite TVs, Wesuit, paddle board, Kayak, scooter, Coffee grinder, Tackle, rope, Outdoor cooker, Prescription lenses, Tyres (spare), Dryers and shampoos for hair .... Errr, hang on, hang on ..
P.P.S. But would we really take all this? Let's stay home in comfy bliss.
You are at Mark’s blog called Baffled Bear Books. Mark is a dark coffee tragic, bibliophile and Guardian of Mawson Bear, a Ponderer of Baffling Things and one of this bright world’s few published bears.
Do you sometimes feel a bit muddled about, well, Things ?
Sometimes rather ruffled when Things just go and, well, Happen ?
Sometimes feel confused one moment and completely baffled the next?
Baffled again
It’s not easy being Grownup. All this business of having to be sophisticated and industrious all day long! It just wears you down. But when you arrive in Mawson’s cosy world, the frazzled reader can flop down among the cushions and relax.
Flop among cushions
Here you can find the answers to just about nothing at all. You can forget you ever had questions anyway.
Mawson and his friends are befuddled about most things most of the time – just like so many of us. And that’s all right.
She Ran Away From Love by Mawson is all about his little friend Frilly feeling hopelessly baffled by Big Questions.
‘A brilliant children’s picture book that does well to pick you up from a bad day. Writing about love, dreams, happiness, and finding your own identity is all found within this short happy book.‘ Review on Amazon UK.
Dreamy Days and Random Naps is about dreaming big and napping mightily. Perfect for all this bright world’s day-dream believers. Could this be you?
And in his first book, It’s A Bright World To Feel Lost In , Mawson attempts to put into words that mysterious feeling of Feeling Lost. (See pictures above for covers of the books.)
You are at Mark’s blog, Baffled Bear Books. Mark is guardian and hapless typist for Mawson Bear, Ponderer of Baffling Things and one of this bright world’s few published bears. Baffled Bear Books ABN: 4787910119
The genre Cli-Fi (Climate fiction) is making increasing headway these days as writers look at what a future world, wrecked by climate change, might turn out like. Sue Parritt took a close look at Australasia – Australia and New Zealand. Australia, of course, has already had increasingly severe fires, floods and droughts. I found Sue Parritt’s vision to be scarily plausible as well as entertaining.
The story: Australia and Aotearoa (New Zealand) are ravaged by droughts. In Australia in particular. The coastal plains have been inundated by rising sea levels. The ‘Whites, although impoverished by today’s standards, hang on to power through apartheid. They force the ‘Browns’, mostly refugee populations from the drowned Pacific Islands, to labour on the little arable land that remains.
We see this future from the point of view of a resistance movement, the ‘Women’s Line’, as they endure dangers to help the serfs held in the underground prisons to escape to what we hope will be a better life for them in Aotearoa. This is an Underground Railroad of the future.
Sannah, “The Storyteller”, belongs to the Women’s Line. When a light skinned stranger calling himself Kaire arrives at her dome she must consider whether he is a spy. The twin mysteries of Kaire’s origins and Sannah’s purpose in “storytelling” drive along the narrative in the first novel. Kaire’s background when revealed gives us another viewpoint of the conditions on the planet.
As with all resistance movements, nobody quite knows who is to be fully trusted. Missions are planned, and after excruciating buildups of tension some go wrong.
We have escapes by desert and by sea, rescues, betrayals, brutalities and passions. Yet Parritt’s low key writing makes this stark way of life seem almost normalised, which makes it all the more disturbing; and the wreckage of not just the planet but of humanity springs out at us.
“I want readers to grasp what is happening not only in contemporary Australia, but throughout the world with regard to refugees and the ongoing environmental degradation that poses increasing problems for humanity… By writing fiction that I believe could easily become fact, I hope to inspire more ‘ordinary’ people to take a stand and work for a more equitable and sustainable world.”
Another Cli-Fit series I loved and that you may well endure is the Chronicles of the Pale by Clare Rhoden. You can see my review here.
You are at Baffled Bear Books, the blog of Mark, guardian and blundering typist for Mawson Bear, Ponderer of Baffling Things and one of this bright world’s few published bears. Mawson is writer bear of It’s A Bright World To Feel Lost In.
The Search So Far: Mawson’s Guardian, Mark, and the Guardian-ess set off to see the Whale Sharks that migrate up past the Ningaloo Reef in the North of Western Australia. But on our day out on the water, hours passed with no sighting of a whale shark. We feared we would miss out altogether. But then suddenly they were sighted.
The skipper steered into position. We tourists shuffled on bums down to the marlin board, tense for the word to drop in. If the skipper had judged right, the whale shark would cruise in front of us. Go! And there it was! Just below the surface, moving along with a smooth up and down motion of the whole body. I was so excited that if I had not needed the snorkel to breathe, I would have eaten it.
We were actually swimming with this great beast. We spread out into a semi circle and followed as long as possible. Some lucky people were alongside the shark, on either side, 3 or 4 metres away, with a good clear view. Some saw mostly its big tail and other snorkelers. The beast seemed unconcerned by us and never changed its pace. It easily pulled ahead within a few minutes.
The boat came round to pick us up. This required using upper body strength and a big kicking lunge to land your torso as high up the marlin board as possible before clambering up to the deck itself. No problem for me in the calm water within the reef. But the swell had gotten up as the cold front got closer. If the stern lifted up in the swell at the same time as you made your lunge, your big seal flop could be difficult, even bruising. I clobbered my chest. Several people struggled with it. The crew helped pull us up, of course.
A second beast was seen and then a third one. The vessel steered into a new position, and again we slid into the water. Several people this time got an excellent along-side swim. They got those classic “I swam with a Whale Shark’ instagramable photos. But I saw only a powerful tail ahead of me. That tail moved almost lazily but it made my effort to keep up with it seem like a flutter board chasing a silent jet ski. I swam as hard as I ever have; and the crew member, Ellie, who was helping me hauled me along too. I had never moved in the water so fast. But still not much of a view for me this time. And I was really drained. Been in the water 4 times now. But it was not over. The RV Thunder turned to try for a third swim.
We came around again ahead of the course of the whale sharks as they cruised seemingly without effort north along side Ningaloo Reef. Only 14 or so our group of 20 went in this time, the others exhausted. With help of crew member Ellie, I got into a good position. The spotted beast was huge, perhaps 4 metres, bigger than the others. I managed to keep up alongside it although it took the most powerful swimming of my life and Ellie towing me as well. Within 3 or 4 minutes perhaps, although it felt longer, the animal had glided ahead until there was only its tail to see. We boarded RV Thunder for the last time, collectively elated and exhausted. ( I needed help to get up out of the water this time.) All had seemed lost only an hour before. But now we had actually swum with the whale sharks!
Then our day got even better. The earliest hump back whales of the season were out there too! We hadn’t even expected whales.
To see a whale even from 150-200 metres or so, a huge pecoral fin surging out of the side of a swell and a big body curving up, blowing, and diving down (“Tharr she blows!”) is an uplifting sight. We saw one perhaps 50 m away surfing along the side of a big swell and turning its big pink belly to us. Another (or perhaps the same) turned to the vessel. Yes! It came on, swirled around until it was belly side up, all white and pink, dipped lower while still upside down, and went right under the boat. We think we saw 5 different migrating humpback whales. What a day! What a day!
(I couldn’t get vids of the whales, sorry, but here are more whale sharks we saw that day taken by Daniel Browne of Coral Bay Eco Tours.
Note: All under water pics shown here are by Daniel Browne of Coral Bay Eco Tours.
You are at Mark’s blog called Baffled Bear Books. Mark is a dark coffee tragic, bibliophile and Guardian of Mawson Bear, a Ponderer of Baffling Things and one of this bright world’s few published bears.
Baffled Bear Books 