The Lia Mendez trilogy, spans three generations of the Mendez-Kremzier and Heiman families, the paths of their lives intersected by the conflicts and changes which shaped Central Europe in the first half of the twentieth century. Of Exile and Yearning (2009) and Across the Burning (2010) are the first two books of the trilogy.

Set in the era when Europe’s thousand year thrust for universal fraternity detours into the Communist tyranny, Taking Wing follows an ordinary man and an extraordinary woman, Frederic and Lia, as they struggle to stay sane in the face of civic stupidity and individual evil.

Lia is called to open her arms to the difficult truth that has always been her pillar of fire. Frederic, as husband and father, strives to hold on to all that is real, and not be stifled by his natural scepticism. Their children, Regan, inheritor of a past of wonder and betrayal, fights for self-definition, and Mercedes, a child born wounded, seeks the source of healing within.

Taking Wing is a story about belonging and forsaking, the loss of all and the state of abandonment, and finally, the coming to nothing that turns out to be everything under another land’s new stars.

ISBN 9781920787202

Literary fiction

pb 233 x 151 mm

268 pages

$28.95

Across the Burning is the second novel of the Lia Mendez trilogy, an epic which spans three generations of the Mendez-Kremzier and Heiman families, the paths of their lives intersected by the conflicts and changes which shaped Central Europe in the first half of the twentieth century.

Once enthralled by the grand vistas of travel, Frederic returns to Hungary as Europe is about to burst into the fire of World War II. He, a sharp and worldly non-believer, returns to Rudi Wolf, his soul friend, to Lia Mendez, his only love – his two Jewish friends now married, but still welcoming him as part of their life. With passion and loyalty to each other the three friends face the Nazi occupation.

A story of sensibility and identity, of exile, abandonment and returning to yourself.

Of Exile and Yearning, the first book of the trilogy, was released in September 2009.

ISBN   9781920787189

Literary fiction

pb  234 x 150 mm

290 pp

$29.95  

Catherine Hoffmann’s novel, Of Exile and Yearning, was released on 15 September 2009 by Indra Publishing.

Of Exile and Yearning is the first book of the Lia Mendez trilogy.

This epic novel is set in Europe from 1910 to the mid-1930s, exploring lives buffeted by the turbulent historical forces transforming central Europe from the last flourish of the Austro-Hungarian empire to the chilling build-up of the Second World War.

Lia and Frederic meet as children, never declare their love for one another, and yet remain inseparably bonded. From the comfort and security of her Jewish home, Lia chooses her own exile, with devastating effect on her family. Her journey is a personal spiritual quest. Frederic, neither Jewish nor religious, emphatically refuses commitment to any ideal or belief. For him, life is for adventure and travel, the quest for enjoyment, and never to be taken too seriously.

For the continuation of Lia and Frederic’s story, wait for Across the Burning, the second book of the trilogy, to be released in mid-2010.

Catherine’s three earlier works, Perilous Journey (1981), Crystal (1987) and Forms of Bliss (1988), were all published by Greenhouse Publications.

The narrative confronts issues still critical to contemporary society – the misuse of power and the struggle for human rights, issues of sexuality and religion, and the search for identity.

‘ … a story … about the impact of repression on the human spirit – and the way, despite all odds, humanity struggles endlessly against worldly authority.‘ – Justice Michael Kirby

Oct 2005, 176 pp
Paperback, 210 x 138 mm
Fiction; 1st Edition,
ISBN: 1 92078715 1
RRP $aud 26.95
ISBN(13): 9781920787158

The Author
John Bartlett worked as a Catholic priest in Mindanao in the Southern Philippines from 1971 until 1980. He returned to Australia and left the priesthood, working in a variety of jobs for the next twenty years before returning to his first love – writing.

His features and short stories have been published in a variety of newspapers and magazines and he works now as a freelance writer, editor and teacher. John lives on the southern coast of Australia.

Mark is delicate as a child, who suffers the loss of his father in the war and the premature death of a friend. As the war ends he sees in the refugees who flood into his town, the horror of displacement, hunger, fear, defeat. Because of his ill-health, Mark has to stay for some time in a sanatorium, where he is fascinated and frightened by a very charismatic bigger boy, Sannes, who on one occasion, sexually assaults him. Sannes is the focus of the sequel novel to be published by Indra in late 2004, The Eyes of the Tiger.

From the Bonnegilla migrant camp, to the secondary school examinations board, Mark’s life gradually becomes more established. The story ends on a positive note, as if, after the often harrowing hard work of growing up and settling into a new country Mark feels he is about to set off into the independence of his maturity.

March 2004, 344 pp
Paperback, 216 x 138 mm
ISBN 1 92078703 8
Fiction, 1st edition
RRP $aud 26-95
ISBN-13 9781920787035

The Author
Originally from Denmark, Manfred Jurgensen settled in Australia at the age of twenty-one, working as actor, playwright and reviewer. Manfred started publishing poetry in the early seventies and to date, he has produced thirteen collections.

He taught literature at Melbourne, Monash and Queensland University where he was appointed to a Personal Chair. From 1984 to 1996 he edited the influential journal of multicultural literature, Outrider. In 1988 he edited the bicentennial Penguin anthology, Australian Writing Now (co-editor Robert Adamson).

Over the last twenty years Manfred has published novels, plays, film scripts, diaries, essays, short stories, literary criticism and poetry. In addition to his writings in English, much of his literary and academic work appears in German. He is a prolific translator and advocate of contemporary Australian literature.

Manfred’s books published by Indra, are The Trembling Bridge and The Eyes of the Tiger.

Beginning the love-of-her-life affair with the gorgeous Laine Macready, a girl who wears a Hardie Aimes shirt like no one else can, she is interrupted by a phone call. Her sister, Gillian, brings her the news that their mother, Muriel, had a heart attack at the top of a plum tree she was pruning and died. Irritably Fi sets off on a night-time drive home to help Gillian organise the funeral.

What precisely is home for Fi? Where her mother lived in Northern New South Wales, among the tea-drinking relatives who, as Gillian reminds her, made Fi what she is today? Is home the girl of the moment who happens to make her heart miss a beat? Or is home merely one of the houses Fi has bought in Australia or leased in Bali?

Fi is contrary, her head and her heart responding to different music. And as a child, Fi was sensitive to the ghostly spirits of the Bundjalung who inhabited the land the Hindmarshes and the Darks took over for dairy farms. How does she reconcile the mutterings and wailings and chantings she hears in her heart with the classic cinema sound booming in her head and the skin-smarting indignity of betrayal?

A novel combining a love story with a perspective on the farmers’ settlement history of the Far North Coast of New South Wales, that grew with new grass on old rainforest soil.

March 2003, 232 pp
Paperback, 216 x 138 mm
ISBN 0 9578735 8 1
Literary fiction, 1st edition
RRP $aud 22-95
ISBN-13 9780957873582

The Author
Carolyn van Langenberg grew up in the rural hinterland of the Far North Coast of New South Wales. She has travelled in Southeast Asia and Europe. Carolyn’s books reflect her background in Australian and English literature, Asian history and creative writing. She lives with her husband in the Blue Mountains.

The fish lips trilogy, set in Malaysia and Australia from the 1940s to the 21st century, looks at three angles on love: heterosexual, homosexual and tortured.

In fish lips, Rose, Li-tsieng’s paramour, becomes a ghost when the Japanese bombed Penang in 1941. Was she ever real?

Fiona Hindmarsh in The Teetotaller’s Wake longs to be back with her new girlfriend during the family ceremonies that follow her mother’s death.

In Blue Moon, urban conservationist Badul Mukhapadai tries to save Penang, Malaysia, from developers and falls in love with the clean air of Byron Bay, Australia, where he consummates his passion for the prickly historian, Gillian Hindmarsh.

The Fish Lips Trilogy… by Carolyn van Langenberg
Fish Lips 2001 $aud22.95 ISBN: 0 95858059 6
The Teetotaller’s Wake 2003 $aud22.95 ISBN: 0 95787358 1
Blue Moon 2004$aud27.95ISBN: 1 92078710 0

In The Real Desire, the lenses of art, philosophy, sensuality, and the dreamscape invite us to explore the many guises of desire. A childhood interwoven with Aboriginal history, the banalities of buying real estate, discussion of lingerie, writers and writing, and feminist analysis of some of the great philosophers of the past.

Robyn Ferrell has brought together in one volume essays of discovery – “Pinjarra 1970″; rites of passage – “Kingdom of God” and “Feminine Arts”; disillusionment – “Paris Does Not Exist”; and critical analysis – “Hemingway’s Typewriter” and “Real Desire”.

Robyn combines the clarity of journalistic prose with the rigor of academic analysis. These essays are written for general interest as well as academic investigation.

Before he offered, it had not occurred to me that he could want what I wanted. Or, rather, that he could give this shape to what I wanted; an erotic definition. Because philosophy tutorials had been such a cerebral pleasure, like the cold light of stars. His skin, too, was cool and he continued to have a sylvan quality, only now under the influence of passion he had become a satyr or minor forest deity. from Feminine Arts

In Europe, the place of art in things becomes suddenly much clearer. There, one can see the old power under the new, like the original timber beneath the paint. In the grand architecture, the very place, that overbearing grandeur makes it not possible to avoid consciousness of the necessity of art in a world of an ancien régime; the consolation and subversion, the reflection art provides. from Paris Does Not Exist

They say that a dream of water refers to deep feeling. Aesthetics is that branch of philosophy which considers feeling. It deals with beauty, art, sensibility, passion. It would deal, if it could, with love. It is a quixotic enterprise, like reclaiming land from the sea. The tides of feeling are governed by a force we do not get to command; but we must make some effort for fear of being drowned in it. from Interpretation of Dreams

Paperback, 210 x 138 mm, 196 pp
Literary essays, 1st edition
ISBN: 1 92078701 1
RRP $aud 27-95
ISBN-13 9781920787011
Short-listed NSW Premier’s Prize

The Author
Robyn Ferrell worked as a journalist on the Sydney Morning Herald before doing her doctorate in philosophy at the University of New South Wales. Now she is the Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Melbourne. As well as her books, Robyn is the author of numerous academic and journalistic articles.

Robyn is drawn to the creative breadth of essays, which can be didactic or elliptical, erudite or impassioned, and in which you can tell stories, gossip, advance speculations and explore feelings. Robyn has been a student of desire for as long as she has been a writer. The two have always accompanied each other – feeling and analysis, theory and expression, world view and personal opinion.

Robyn’s earlier books
Genres of Philosophy (Ashgate 2002)
Passion In Theory (Routledge 1996)
The Weather and Other Gods (Frances Allen 1990)
Co-editor, Cartographies: Post-structuralism and the Mapping of Bodies and Spaces (Allen & Unwin 1991)

Jurgensen’s new novel depicts evil as a seductively demonic power of rampant decomposition, generating from the realm of personal intimacy to the corruption of civilised society. Its narrative of power and passion takes the reader on a frightening journey, culminating in apparitions of a predatory god.

March 2004, 400pp
Paperback, 234 x 153 mm
Literary fiction, 1st edition
ISBN 1 92078711 9
RRP $aud 27.95
ISBN-13 9781920787111

The Author
Originally from Denmark, Manfred Jurgensen settled in Australia at the age of twenty-one, working as actor, playwright and reviewer. Manfred started publishing poetry in the early seventies and to date, he has produced thirteen collections.

He taught literature at Melbourne, Monash and Queensland University where he was appointed to a Personal Chair. From 1984 to 1996 he edited the influential journal of multicultural literature, Outrider. In 1988 he edited the bicentennial Penguin anthology, Australian Writing Now (co-editor Robert Adamson).

Over the last twenty years Manfred has published novels, plays, film scripts, diaries, essays, short stories, literary criticism and poetry. In addition to his writings in English, much of his literary and academic work appears in German. He is a prolific translator and advocate of contemporary Australian literature.

Manfred’s books published by Indra, are The Trembling Bridge and The Eyes of the Tiger.

The garden faced the Hydrangea Temple near the sea. It was one of those old tea-houses that have a verandah on all four sides to view the garden in all seasons. When it was the hydrangea season the big wild-grown flowers bowed down in the rain. I would press them to my face and drink the water gathered in their petals. They tasted lavender, blue and purple…

No-one lives here anymore, this is the house my mother bought for me to grow up in. It was here that I was looked after by a woman I called ‘Aunty’, while my mother worked as a geisha in Tokyo…

He had told me about the woman in the hospital… she had been his mistress for nine years, and now she was in a sanatorium. The room had glass windows on one side, facing the river which ran into the Imperial moat and you could see the same SNOW crystal neon sign from up high in his study.

Our bodies were bathed in sweat. My hair was twisted around him like a rope with its strands come undone…

Tokyo, lying below had looked like a big box of sparkling jewels. The first photos that he took of me, naked, sealed our relationship. My smiling eyes are looking into his, past the camera lens. Images of light and shadow, and his own vision of me…we spent many long afternoons taking photographs. Slowly he licked his thumb, and ran it around my nipple, to make it glisten wet…

2002, 168pp
Paperback, 216 x 138 mm
ISBN 0 9578735 0 6
1st edition
RRP $aud 21.95
ISBN-13 9780957873506

The Author
Wendy Ella Wright is an Australian who graduated from Sophia University, Tokyo, where she has lived on and off for many years. Wendy was awarded her doctorate at the University of Adelaide. The Air of Tokyo is her first published novel.

In Japan her poetry and translations have been published in such magazines as Tokyo Journal, OVNI and Artworks.

In Australia, her poetry, prose and translations have been broadcast in “Poetica A” on ABC Radio, and by 5UV, Writers’ Radio.

In this story of mad imagination & taut relationships Kirwan puts popular wisdom and our concepts of time on its head. As Arb Ginghus says, “If there is one thing I despise it is common sense for it will teach you nothing that is worth knowing; it is the obscure, the impractical, the impulsive which tells you what is what.”

Kirwan’s mordant wit takes us on a journey where recollection and perception become confused, strangely echoing our own lives.

A beautifully crafted, disarming novel.

For readers who like psychological thrillers, dark fantasy, a surrealist take on life.

December 2004, 160 pp
Paperback, 210 x 138 mm
ISBN 1 92078706 2
Literary fiction, 1st edition
RRP $aud 23-95
ISBN-13 978

The Author
For twenty years since the mid-seventies, Valerie Kirwan was something of a legend in Melbourne theatre, writing, directing and performing plays which challenged and enchanted her audiences.

More recently, Valerie is writing novellas and short stories in which she tests her characters against the subconscious stresses that exist below the surface of our outwardly normal, everyday world. Through intrigue, suspense, and more than a little sardonic humour, Valerie challenges us to join in her psychological dramas.

Valerie’s published books
Taking A Fool to Paradise (Indra 2004)
Lovers and Losers of the Last Century (Indra 2001)
The Disease of the Silkworm (Hornets Nest 2000)
The Moon is Bloodshot (Hornets Nest 1999)
The Will to Fall (Penguin 1984)