Sidharta Books & Print

Bonita Gail was born 1970 in Orbost, the corn capital, East Gippsland, Victoria and spent the first twelve years growing up in Cabbage Tree Creek, a tiny blink and ya miss it town thirty minutes north along the Princess Highway, population one hundred at best.
A bushie at heart she remembers fishing more times than not with her parents and younger sister and the many friends who came along, as well as camping, netting rabbits, picking paddock mushrooms, picking and pressing wild flowers, crashing bikes (unintentionally), sidestepping snakes, wood chops, community cricket, barbeques in the bush and all-age parties.
Halfway through grade seven she moved to Tassie’s west coast with her mum, sister and brother, dropped out of high school by the end of year nine to work in a museum kiosk, then a supermarket for eight years.
Soon after arriving in Tassie she met her future husband, also Victorian-born with a similar upbringing, only he caught snakes as a kid, held them in milk tins before releasing them again and ran about sugar cane in Queensland. They soon became friends, then serious years later. Theirs too was a forbidden love in the beginning and now after twenty-four years together they have three kids and reside by the sea in Tassie’s east. Between sustaining a home, a hubby, two teenage boys, a little girl and a summer job, Bonita enjoys photography, simple drawing, a good romance – be it book or movie – and Aussie dramas. She’s always had the desire to write a novel, encouraged by her grade eight English teacher Mister Flemming, though only found true inspiration upon moving to Bicheno years ago in the oceanic views and the wonderful friends she made during her three years in the warm heart of the east.