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Puberty Blues
The definitive story of teenagers navigating the chaos of life
‘By day, we were at school learning logarithms, but by night – in the back of cars, under the bowling alley, on Cronulla Beach, or, if you were lucky, in a bed while someone’s parents were out – you paid off your friendship ring.’
For Deb and Sue, life is about surfies, panel vans, straight-leg Levis, nicking off from school, getting wasted and fitting in. But why should guys have all the fun?
Puberty Blues is about ‘top chicks’ and ‘surfie spunks’ and the kids who don’t quite make the cut: it recreates with fascinating honesty a world where only the gang and the surf count.
A note from Kathy
An Australian cult classic.
Its popularity means that I can never escape puberty. I’m currently having my fourth. There was my actual puberty, then the book, then the movie of the book directed by Bruce Beresford, and now the 8 hour mini series. Channel Ten have just commissioned a second 8 hour mini series.
As I’m mid menopause, it’s all very hormonally confusing! I think the follow up, “Menopause Blues” must be on the creative cards.
Love for the book
Puberty Blues is a profoundly moral story.
I don’t recall reading Puberty Blues so much as devouring it. I was fascinated. The honesty of the story made it hysterical and terrifying at the same time.
What I'm up to
A window into my world...
Here’s a selection of scribblings in which I peel all the way down to my emotional underwear – a psychological striptease that occasionally reveals all.
My rogues gallery
The things I get up to when I should be writing….
I’ve added my fave pics of the people who are my human wonder bras – uplifting and supportive and make me look bigger and better. Plus the odd snap of me too. There may be a few faces you recognise – but nobody two-faced, that’s for sure.
One liners, wise cracks and witticisms
I think women are each other’s human Wonderbras – uplifting, supportive and making each other look bigger and better.
If he wants breakfast, tell him to sleep in the kitchen.
Men think monogamy is something you make dining tables out of.
Many marriages break up for religious reasons – he thinks he’s a god and she doesn’t.
Love prepares you for marriage the way needlepoint prepares you for round-the-world solo yachting.
Boys will be boys, and so will a load of middle-aged boys who should know better.
Ladies who lynch.
No wife ever shot a husband while he was vacuuming.
I think therefore I’m divorced.
All husbands think they’re Gods. If only their wives weren’t atheists.
Happy wife = happy life.
I couldn’t ask for a better husband… as much as I’d bloody well like to.
Statistically, 100% of divorces begin with marriage.
Marriage is nature’s way of promoting masturbation.
Marriage is a fun-packed, frivolous activity – only occasionally resulting in death.
It’ll be an amicable split. You’ll both get 50 % of the acrimony.
A new invention is required. The monogamous husband. Patent Pending.
How Do I Hate Thee? Let me Count the Ways.
My wedding vows didn’t say To Love, Hoover and Obey.
I’m having my period so can therefore legally kill you.
You are going to enjoy this marriage, even if I have to divorce you to do so.
A happy marriage is like an orgasm – many of them are faked.
All this emphasis on women faking orgasms, but what about men faking foreplay?
Why do men like intelligent women? Because opposites attract.
Why don’t women tell jokes? Because we marry them.
What does a woman really want in bed? Breakfast.
For women, life is full of lies – I mean doctors maintain that wrinkles don’t hurt.
Legal aid cuts prove that the Tories believe a person is innocent until proven destitute.
Sexist men are so stupid it makes you want to take the ‘men’ out of Mensa.
If a man ever tells you that women fall at his feet – it’s only because he gets them drunk first.
A woman must always fight back. Never just lie back and think of Canberra.
The best cure for menopause is the toy boy diet. A case of having Your Beefcake and Eating It Too.
I don’t fake orgasms. I’m faking being six foot one and seven stone.
Trophy wives tarnish quickly and then get left on the shelf.
Lawyers work 24/7. The partners of lawyers suffer from a bad case of subpoena envy.
Most shrinks should book an appointment with themselves.
The question on the minds of most women is – why doesn’t chocolate go straight to your boobs?
Don’t fall for a man’s puppy dog look… Just get him wormed.
It’s been so long since a man has touched me, not even medical science will want my body.
My top tip for keeping your youth? Lock him in the pool house.
I told myself that it took forty-two facial muscles to frown and only four to stretch out my arm and bitch-slap the witch.