A Fortunate Life for Younger Readers
Publisher: Fremantle Press
Published: March 2018
Genre: Children's, Memoir, Young Adult
Albert Barnett Facey’s memoir was first published in 1981, when he was aged 87 and just nine months before his death. It has since gone on to become a best-selling and award-winning Australian classic. Facey was born in 1894, started work at age eight, and by fourteen was out on his own working the first of many jobs in rural Western Australia. He survived Gallipoli and endured much hardship, adversity and loss throughout his life. Facey is a natural storyteller though he uses the simple language of a man who had no formal education and only became literate as an adult. The optimism and positivity that made him deem his life fortunate is evident throughout the narrative. Facey is often described as “an ordinary man” but his life story will be far from ordinary for contemporary children and it contains numerous talking points for discussions with their parents and teachers.