Nanima – Donna Goddard

March 22, 2023March 22, 2023

Name Changes for Nanima

The Nanima Series has had a few name (and cover) changes. The series is now called the Dadirri Series. Book 1 remains as Nanima. The current book we are on (which is Book 2) is now called Geboor. You will see why in the next part (coming soon).

Recent Review of Nanima

Divine and Enchanting The story shows that life’s challenges can make people forget or lose the feeling of simplicity, magic, and beauty. I like Maliyan’s interactions with Luna and her coffee shop visits at Luna Tiks; the feeling of staying in Euroka’s place; Mrs. Knuckle, the leaf-reader; the part where Maliyan visits the resting place of her parents and also when she attended church. By weaving her past memories with the present, Maliyan finds healing, not only in the physical but also in the spiritual. Maliyan has a better and deeper understanding of it, stressing the importance of protecting and respecting the earth, recognizing herself and her connection to the Divine. It’s refreshing, enlightening and inspirational!

January 21, 2023March 21, 2023

Dadirri Series Background

Here are some real-life places on which the fictional places of the Dadirri Series are based.

The fictional town of Nanima is rural Wellington, N.S.W., Australia.
The main female character has adopted the Aboriginal name of Maliyan, the Wiradjuri name for wedge-tailed eagle (totem for the Binjang mob of Wellington).
Fictional Luna Tiks cafe (Four Cats) is across the road from the empty, pink dance school.
Cathedral Cave (Wellington Caves) is where Maliyan meets the spirit of Wandaang, who wants his ancestor’s bones back.
The tiny fictional town of Yan Yan Gurt (where Maliyan’s ancestors come from) is Stuart Town.
Historic Stuart Town cemetery is the Yan Yan Gurt cemetery where Maliyan senses her ancestor’s spirits.
The mystic artist character, Euroka, gets his name from a family property in the area.

January 9, 2023March 21, 2023

Geboor (Book 2 of Dadirri Series): Shophouse

Spectrum

“I think you are on the spectrum, boo,” said Luna.

Maliyan laughed and thought, Always the joker.

Luna wasn’t smiling and continued sympathetically, “Lots of people are. I mean, I like people on the spectrum. I find them interesting.”

Maliyan wasn’t sure what was worse—Luna’s diagnosis of her mental state or his trying to make it better by kindly reassuring her that, regardless, it was fine with him. It made it all the funnier or all the more disturbing.

October 1, 2022October 1, 2022

Nanima is Published

Nanima (Book 1 of Nanima Series) is now available on Amazon in paperback and ebook. The audiobook will be available in 2 weeks. This new fiction series is located in an Australian rural town, Wellington, N.S.W. (Nanima in the story). It is the area my family come from. My grandfather was a pioneer farmer and made his house from the stones of the river. Farming has been in the family for generations. The series follows the lives of characters I hope you will come to love and welcome into your heart and mind. My writing style is short and succinct—easy to read. However, the messages about life and relationships are both easy and difficult. As is always the case, things seem simple when we understand them, but when we don’t…big mess!

January 1, 2022March 21, 2023

Nanima (Book 1 of Dadirri Series): Discovery

Happy new year, 2022. May you make the most of this year. Here is the beginning of a new story to start the year!

Chapter 1: Nanima

Nanima lay in a pretty-as-a-picture valley at the joining point of two living, breathing rivers. The small country town had an English name, but Nanima was its ancient-as-the-rivers Aboriginal one.

When discovering it, English explorer, Oxley, said, “It is beautifully picturesque.”

Of course, he didn’t really discover it. Even before the local people knew it, the valley and rivers knew themselves. The idea of discovery and consequent possession is used by those with neither the intelligence nor sensitivity to see the value in lives other than their own. Anyway, the Aboriginal people had a different sense of ownership. There is no need to possess anything when there is access to everything. It is only when someone says that your mother belongs to them that there is a problem. For more than fifty thousand years, there wasn’t a problem. For the last two hundred, there was.