I have been lent a children’s book published by the Forest Education Foundation of Tasmania in 2004 called “postcards from the town that disappeared”.  Story and text are by Celia Lendis and it is illustrated by John Lendis.  It has been given a “Notable Book” classification by the Children’s Book Council of Australia.  It is contains numerous coloured illustrations of people, the sawmill, the tramway and other activities in the bush. 

From the back cover: -

“Postcards from the town that disappeared”, takes us on a journey with an eleven year old boy and his pony called Joe.  Together they travel though the thick forests of Tasmania to deliver mail to the town of Wielangta after school.  This was to be the boy’s last summer delivering mail, before a series of bushfires ravaged the area and the town was finally abandoned.  Set during the 1920s, this fictional story, along with the richly evocative paintings, archival photographs and snippets of correspondence, creates a vivid historical portrait of the hardships and joys of living and working in a timber town in Tasmania during the early decades of the twentieth century”.

To me the book has a good feel to it and should not be dismissed a being merely a children’s book.  I believe it has a place beside other serious works in our libraries because of the historical references contained within it.