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Coochiemudlo Island is as much a character in this tale as is Ted Jones, whose biography is woven throughout the book with tales of island life during the 1960s, 1970s and beyond. The decisions ‘Coochie’ locals made and the events that occurred during those decades ultimately brought irreversible change, all in the name of progress, to a small island in Moreton Bay, Queensland, Australia.

Published July 2025

Paperback ISBN 978-0-645325-66-9

When The Garamuts Beat is a memoir of adventure, faith, and peril, that will interest anyone captivated by Pacific history, the impacts of WWII, and the social change that ensued. This is a 346 page book with black and white photos, covering Franz Miltrup’s time on Bougainville from 1938 to 1986. Two sections were added to the story, one of brief biographies of Franz Miltrup’s Marist community and an appendix of short stories of other missionary war tales that complement Franz Miltrup’s experience. They expand the reader’s understanding of the events because they are written from other points of view.

Second Edition Paperback ISBN 978-0-6453256-5-2

Buy from your local bookstore or online through Amazon and other stores in Australia and overseas. In Australia online stores include The Nile, Booktopia, Fishpond and more, otherwise check with your local independent book store. A limited number of signed copies available directly from Christine.

William was a 17-year-old groomsman, an outdoors man-of-action with a wild temperament. Would this head-strong youth follow his father's lace-weaving trade, tethered to the click-clack of a loom in the dark, damp confines of a Norfolk cottage? Or was he destined for a different life? This Australian story traces William 'Cocky' Wall's journey in two parts. Part One: The Convict focusses on a young man transported to Van Diemen's Land to serve out his sentence as an assigned servant. Twice married, fathering 19 children, and with significant support from his two wives, Mary Long, and Eliza Clarke, William became a farmer, publican, innkeeper, and played his part as an early pioneer in Central Victoria and Warrnambool. Part Two: The Currency spanning 117 years explores the lives of 13 surviving children and their descendants. The Currency refers to the first generation born in the colonies; the Walls born to their free-settler mothers and ex-convict father. The book explores how each generation assumed its own place in society over a period spanning 180 years.

This edition was published in November 2023. ISBN 978-0-6453256-4-5