Tassie memoir

Sunshine Coast writer Joanna Barrett’s memoir set in 1970s Tasmania was launched in Beerwah recently. The memoir is called They said we were isolated: my life at Top Farm on Tasmania’s west coast and is published under Joanna’s nom de plume, Joanna Talberg.

The memoir tells the story of Joanna’s and husband Peter’s unlikely adventures on a neglected cattle property on the wild west coast of Tasmania, north west of the town of Zeehan along a hazardous track.

“In 1974 Peter and I went to the west coast with the dream of turning Top Farm into a thriving cattle enterprise,” she said.

“But with cattle prices falling, weather gods that decreed more rain than sun, and our savings shrinking, we faced a choice,” she said.

“Should we stay and try to survive through the cattle downturn, or should we drive away forever from the farm at the end of the track?”

Copies of Joanna’s memoir are available now at Beerwah Newsagency and at Rosetta Books in Maleny. They said we were isolated is also available at ginninderrapress.com.au, barnesandnoble.com, and Amazon Books.