Chasing Dreamtime: A Sea-Going Hitchhiker's Journey Through Memory and Myth

I read this book in about a week and found it to be a recurring nightmare. Very well written but it is more a psychological study of a Catholic priest abuse lady possessed by fears of past occurrences in her young life. I was glad when it was over and the lady was able to resume her life with many positive accomplishments a lifetime of achievements. Good for her.

There are no words in any language to describe just wonderful and powerful this book is. It will rattle your heart and soul, freeing you to soar like Summa way did as she chased Dreamtime.

This excellent book was riveting and entertaining. For someone who loves the sea and islands it is a must read!!

I didnt read this book yet, but I remember about some of the criminal legends of barbados. I was on a mini bus and heard the author talking about her book. I immediately knew I had to read them, because some of the unsolved murders back then, you didnt use to get all the details. The papers only detailed little about those crimes, so its good to hear from people who knew not only the killers but the victims. I know this book will bring back memories about the history of barbados dating back to the early 50's when barbados was just slowly coming out of basic life living conditions. I hope kim will also write a book about public schools back in the 50's and 60's and let us see some student archives and how we use to dress up to go downtown when the queen visit.

There is much to like about this book. Sullaway is a descriptive, analytical writer who can combine scenery with reflection. There sure is plenty of time for reflection while adrift emotionally, and at sea, as Sullaway is in this book. In the dramatic ending, the author manages to weave meaning into seeming disconnected events. Maps, hand drawn and almost piratelike, contain clues about about adventures in the book: Three Kings, Glasshouse Mountains, ominous sketches of sharks and cyclones. Yet for all that, the characters in this book are far too stereotypical and undeveloped. Mick is just another burned out Vietnam Vet; Clari a bitchy British wife born into wealth and irrelevance who married for adventure. Squids is the scrawny but tough runaway kid who ends up at sea. Reading this book you have to ask: aren't there any NORMAL people in the South Pacific? Like clouds gathering for a storm, the first references to Sullaway's troubled past come in floating sentences and afterthoughts: her fathers' polio, the nuns at her school. Still they are drowned in seafaring stories that are more like disjointed narratives. Only after reading the book a second time did the foreshadowings become powerful to me. Its almost like the author saves TOO MUCH for the end. Sullaway becomes so cynical the only true pain I feel in this waterborne litany of recycled memories is when she blew off Richard in Brisbane, only to find Katy and Tom weren't in Bundaberg after all. At Innisfail she turns into Dr. Phil with an australian accent. It is too bad; because she shows true mental strength in Weipa, staring down an 'Abo' beating on his wife. Overworked mentally and physically as a cook and deckhand on the prawn trawler, Sullaway's past was able to come thru without being filtered first by her politically correct takes on Catholicism and its priesthood. Her dreaming---snakes as a metaphor for the groping hands of a priest, for the slithering guilt of original sin, for hands around her throat---crystallizes with stunning effect on the reader in the final pages. A book sure can be hoky when the climax comes in the last few paragraphs, but not Sullaway's. The snake pattern on the Didgeridoo; the pilots' recovery from the sea snake bite from the Abo healer; the ocean covering her troubled past. Sullaway touched her dreamtime and cast off her memories as easily as they threw the squirming mess of seacreatures back into the ocean after they sorted out the prawns. Having faced her worst fear, the snake saved her life. The snake saved the book as well, for which Sullaway should be grateful.

an exciting, one of a kind journey in real time and dream time: sullaway weaves together her adventures in sailing the pacific with an internal journey through memory and self understanding. Highly recommended, whether you have even been on a sailboat or not!

It is amazing Sullaway lived to tell this tale and we, the readers, benefit by getting to tag along from the comfort of our couches. You don't have to be a sailor to be enthralled by this tale of a woman who runs away to find herself. Armchair explorers and true adventurers alike will appreciate this book.

I read this book in about a week and found it to be a recurring nightmare. Very well written but it is more a psychological study of a Catholic priest abuse lady possessed by fears of past occurrences in her young life. I was glad when it was over and the lady was able to resume her life with many positive accomplishments a lifetime of achievements. Good for her.

There are no words in any language to describe just wonderful and powerful this book is. It will rattle your heart and soul, freeing you to soar like Summa way did as she chased Dreamtime.

This excellent book was riveting and entertaining. For someone who loves the sea and islands it is a must read!!

I didnt read this book yet, but I remember about some of the criminal legends of barbados. I was on a mini bus and heard the author talking about her book. I immediately knew I had to read them, because some of the unsolved murders back then, you didnt use to get all the details. The papers only detailed little about those crimes, so its good to hear from people who knew not only the killers but the victims. I know this book will bring back memories about the history of barbados dating back to the early 50's when barbados was just slowly coming out of basic life living conditions. I hope kim will also write a book about public schools back in the 50's and 60's and let us see some student archives and how we use to dress up to go downtown when the queen visit.

There is much to like about this book. Sullaway is a descriptive, analytical writer who can combine scenery with reflection. There sure is plenty of time for reflection while adrift emotionally, and at sea, as Sullaway is in this book. In the dramatic ending, the author manages to weave meaning into seeming disconnected events. Maps, hand drawn and almost piratelike, contain clues about about adventures in the book: Three Kings, Glasshouse Mountains, ominous sketches of sharks and cyclones. Yet for all that, the characters in this book are far too stereotypical and undeveloped. Mick is just another burned out Vietnam Vet; Clari a bitchy British wife born into wealth and irrelevance who married for adventure. Squids is the scrawny but tough runaway kid who ends up at sea. Reading this book you have to ask: aren't there any NORMAL people in the South Pacific? Like clouds gathering for a storm, the first references to Sullaway's troubled past come in floating sentences and afterthoughts: her fathers' polio, the nuns at her school. Still they are drowned in seafaring stories that are more like disjointed narratives. Only after reading the book a second time did the foreshadowings become powerful to me. Its almost like the author saves TOO MUCH for the end. Sullaway becomes so cynical the only true pain I feel in this waterborne litany of recycled memories is when she blew off Richard in Brisbane, only to find Katy and Tom weren't in Bundaberg after all. At Innisfail she turns into Dr. Phil with an australian accent. It is too bad; because she shows true mental strength in Weipa, staring down an 'Abo' beating on his wife. Overworked mentally and physically as a cook and deckhand on the prawn trawler, Sullaway's past was able to come thru without being filtered first by her politically correct takes on Catholicism and its priesthood. Her dreaming---snakes as a metaphor for the groping hands of a priest, for the slithering guilt of original sin, for hands around her throat---crystallizes with stunning effect on the reader in the final pages. A book sure can be hoky when the climax comes in the last few paragraphs, but not Sullaway's. The snake pattern on the Didgeridoo; the pilots' recovery from the sea snake bite from the Abo healer; the ocean covering her troubled past. Sullaway touched her dreamtime and cast off her memories as easily as they threw the squirming mess of seacreatures back into the ocean after they sorted out the prawns. Having faced her worst fear, the snake saved her life. The snake saved the book as well, for which Sullaway should be grateful.

an exciting, one of a kind journey in real time and dream time: sullaway weaves together her adventures in sailing the pacific with an internal journey through memory and self understanding. Highly recommended, whether you have even been on a sailboat or not!

It is amazing Sullaway lived to tell this tale and we, the readers, benefit by getting to tag along from the comfort of our couches. You don't have to be a sailor to be enthralled by this tale of a woman who runs away to find herself. Armchair explorers and true adventurers alike will appreciate this book.