All four quarters of the Moon

Eleven-year-old Peijing enjoys making mooncakes (filled pastries with a cooked egg yolk in the middle) with Ah Ma, her grandmother, on the night before they are all due to leave Singapore for a new life in Australia, and the Moon and mooncakes of various kinds recur throughout the book. Little sister Biju firmly believes in the Jade Rabbit who lives on the Moon, and she, although only 5, is already as good a storyteller as Peijing is an artist, but to a traditional Chinese family, creative activities are very much second to working hard and getting good grades in more academic subjects.  They are to discover a very different way of life in Australia. When Ma Ma arrives at school to feed her daughters with chopsticks from a set of tiffin tins, this is, of course, hugely embarrassing, but on the second day a teacher tells Ma Ma that she is not allowed on school grounds. Invited with her class to spend a week camping, Peijing is firmly told by Ma Ma that she has a perfectly good bed at home, so why should she want to go away and sleep in a tent?  The other girl not going camping is Joanna, who has befriended Peijing, and it soon becomes clear that Joanna is being bullied, starved and beaten by her father. Their lovely teacher, Miss Lena, spends the week with the two girls and winkles the truth out of Joanna, so wheels are set in motion to help her to a better life.

The two sisters have invented Little World, with Peijing’s cut-out paper animals and Biju’s stories, which they think is their secret, but their creation doesn’t make it to Australia, so they start again, and are soon adding llamas, alpacas and Australian animals to the new collection. The relationship between the sisters is delightful- sometimes Biju is a pain, but they are very close.

The family have to adjust in various ways: Ba Ba (Dad) becomes less formal in his working clothes, Ma Ma finds a job and enrols in English classes, and it becomes clear that Ah Ma has the beginnings of dementia, making some hard choices necessary. Adapting to a new way of life has its problems, but they are settling in well, and the girls’ creative talents are being allowed to develop as the story ends.

Shirley Marr is a first-generation Chinese/Australian, having anglicized her name from Mah Sher Li ten years ago when her first book was published – she says she would have more confidence in using her Chinese name now. Her previous book A Glasshouse of Stars won two awards, was shortlisted for other awards, and nominated for the Carnegie Medal.