Lessons on recovery from Australia’s Black Summer bushfires – one family & community’s story
In When The Smoke Clears: Surviving the Australian bushfires, author Chrissy Guinery (Falling Up Stairs, Room to Breathe) takes us inside the smoke-drenched landscape of the South Coast as over three months she and her family are evacuated numerous times, separated by raging fires and ultimately, her daughter’s home is lost among the hundreds destroyed on New Year’s Eve in the Bateman’s Bay region.
While people across Australia and around the world watched on through media reports, few can comprehend the length and extent of fire terror experienced not only by the people of South Coast communities, but in other fire ravaged regions across the nation.
‘My middle-daughter’s house is burning down and I’ve lost contact with my eldest daughter as the fire front threatens her home. It’s the last day of 2019 and it feels like the end of the world.’
So begins this fast-paced, personal and grassroots account of living through a torturous fire season and finding a way to push through to recovery.
And while the eyewitness accounts of being caught in a bushfire emergency are remarkable, so too are the insights, advice and lessons learned about what it will take to recover, including from a range of experts.
A postscript to the book describes the way fire victims barely had the chance to breath clean air, before another emergency came to shake their world.
‘This is a story of resilience and hope’, Chrissy says, ‘but it begins by bringing the reader into the reality of being surrounded by out-of-control bushfires for three months, and ends with a plea not to forget those who are still a long way from recovery.’
Chrissy Guinery is all about empowering others.
As a successful author and motivational speaker, Chrissy is renowned for her infectious joy, passionate faith and her desire to see others rise to fulfil their purpose and potential. To achieve this, she has been sharing her life secrets for more than 20 years in a down-to-earth relatable style, leaving people with essential tools for pursuing a more effective and fulfilling life.
She is the author of Falling Up Stairs (2016) and Room to Breathe (2018) and children’s book, Buzz Loves His Friends.
