Allan Baillie
Author of Little Brother
About the Author
Allan Baillie was born on January 29, 1943, in Scotland. At the age of six, after his father had died and his mother remarried, Baillie and his family moved to Australia. He wrote and illustrated his first book at the age of thirteen. After finishing high school he became a cadet journalist with show more the Melbourne's Sun. Baillie sold his first story to a farming newspaper for four pounds (eight dollars). After a near death experience, Baillie began to travel all over the world. He returned home to work for the newspaper again but had heard about the discontent in Camobodia and Laos and was interested in traveling there as a freelance journalist. The Vietnam War was going on at that time as well as civil unrest in Laos. Although there was nothing in particular going on in Cambodia, Prince Sihanouk banned Western journalists, so Baillie entered the country as an artist. He wrote an adult novel, Mask Maker, set in Laos after that, and continued to write stories based on his experiences in the Far East and elsewhere. His books include Adrift, Little Brother, The China Coin, Riding with Thunderbolt: The Diary of Ben Cross, and A Taste of Cockroach. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Series
Works by Allan Baillie
Aussie Bites - IMP 1 copy
Eine Münze führt nach China 1 copy
Gefangen im Wirbelsturm 1 copy
Theo, der große, gute Wolf 1 copy
Our Sunburnt Country 1 copy
Associated Works
The Road to Camelot: Tales of the Young Merlin, Arthur, Lancelot and More (2002) — Contributor — 38 copies
Into the Future: another exciting collection of stories from sixteen of Australia's top children's authors (1991) — Contributor — 12 copies
Bittersweet [eleven new stories of... anguish, thrills, heartache, and humour] (1992) — Contributor — 4 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 1943
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- Australia
- Birthplace
- Scotland, UK
- Occupations
- children's book author
- Awards and honors
- International Board on Books for Young People, IBBY Honour (1988)
Members
Discussions
YA Historical Vietnam story told from child's viewpoint in Name that Book (October 2010)
Reviews
Based on an incident that actually occurred when Japanese invaders entered Rangoon, the story of a defiant act that made the oppressors look foolish indeed. A quietly powerful book grounded in courage and individuality.
Two stories told side by side, Drac fighting the evil Gremlin and children acting out the fantasy in the garden, which was the joint winner of the Australian Children's Book Council's Picture Book of the Year Award 1989.
Lists
Awards
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 47
- Also by
- 15
- Members
- 895
- Popularity
- #28,623
- Rating
- 3.6
- Reviews
- 17
- ISBNs
- 145
- Languages
- 4
- Favorited
- 2
Trigger warnings: Physical assault and injury, blood, grief and loss depiction, murder, death of a father in the past and other people
Score: Five points out of ten.
This review can also be found on The StoryGraph.
The First Voyage is inaccurate at best, and cultural appropriation at worst.
I saw this book hiding in the historical shelves and after reading a book in the same genre as this (and not enjoying it) I hoped that this would be a better one so I picked it up and finally read it. It was but only by a small margin and because the narrative has so many flaws outweighing the positive aspects I won't consider rereading this. It starts with the main character Bent Beak who doesn't have a last name (the only other book that has a name system like this is the Chronicles of Ancient Darkness by Michelle Paver) living in what is now Timor-Leste (for some reason the book calls it Timor. Why?)
Here's where the flaws surface: I couldn't relate to any of the characters in the novel considering it kills off characters left, right and centre like it's nobody's business. Really? I guess it's an effort to reduce character soup as there were a lot of characters (whose names I forgot for some of them) and it could've been longer since it's less than 200 pages (now don't get me wrong. A book can be under 200 pages and still be outstanding but not every book can pull that off.) The one I read couldn't do so successfully because it left me wanting more out of it than what it offered. But here's the biggest issue: the book would be better off if someone parallel to the characters wrote it rather than someone dissimilar to them. The fact that the afterword used the term Aborigine (which is outdated and could mean anything) doesn't sit right with me. If it used a term like Indigenous Australian it would've been better.… (more)