My Story …

I’m Jemima

and I’m passionate about picture books!

I didn’t always love reading or books. While I enjoyed reading and listening to stories in my earlier years, especially at library visits with my mother, or my father’s oral recounts of One Thousand and One Nights, by high school, I struggled to focus, and I found it difficult to connect with the books around me. I turned to art, which helped me manage the rest of my schooling and to feel free and good about myself. It wasn’t until after I left school - when I discovered books that felt relevant and interesting to me - that a love for reading was rekindled.

During my years as a teacher, I thoroughly enjoyed using picture books to teach across all subject areas. Both as a teacher and later, a school counsellor, I strived to help students feel seen and develop a sense of belonging. These experiences, along with my earlier relationship with books and reading, is partly what motivates me to write stories that interest and inspire readers who never see themselves in books, or are reluctant to read. As a child of the diaspora – an ‘in-betweener’ born and raised in Australia with Arab roots, and a connection to Turkish culture through marriage – I am driven to investigate and continue disrupted narratives in my writing.

I value helping people to feel more empowered, resilient and authentic in their lives. Having parented three daughters into adulthood, I now channel these values through my professional work as a psychologist and in my writing.

Fun Facts about me

  • Believe it or not, I was terrified of dogs!

  • Draw. And swing on a swing. And roller skate. Oops, that’s 3 things.

  • Noisy! We woke to the sound of the circus theme song on the Arabic-language radio program announcing the daily news. Other sounds of activity may have included several or all of the following: the pounding of garlic in a mortar and pestle, the whirring of a sewing machine, the grinding of a drill, the thud of a hammer, the whining of a drop saw, the crowing of a rooster or clucking of chickens; all while the television was often on in the background. 

  • Art. I especially loved taking and developing my own black and white photographs in a place called a ‘dark room’. It took a long time to produce one photograph compared to today, but the slow process was very soothing and grounding. 

  • Growing up, we had parrots, and chickens, and rabbits. Then as an adult, my family and I looked after a hobby farm in Melbourne where we had two horses, a Shetland pony, a dog the size of a pony, chooks, a rooster, two Anglo Nubian goats and a stray cat. Now, back in Sydney/ Dharug country, we just have a dog, His name is Benny. 

  • Ooh there’s too many, but a quick five include: The Book that Almost Rhymed by Omar Abed, illustrated by Hatem Ali; My Deadly Boots by Carl Merrison & Hakea Hustler, illustrated by Samantha Campbell; Sitti’s Secrets by Naomi Shihab Nye, illustrated by Nancy Carpenter ; Words that Taste Like Home by Sandhya Parappukkaran, illustrated by Michelle Pereira and Refugees by Brian Bilston, illustrated by Jose Sanabria

  • I like to mix it up.

    I have a room lined with books where I write sometimes, but often I like to write outside under our crepe myrtle tree, or on an egg chair in the sun. Occassionally, I write on the sofa, but mostly, I write at the dining room table, often without realising how much room my scattered papers and lap top take up. My family often have to squish down one end of the table to eat. 

  • Elif Shafak, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Arandhati Rau, Naomi Shihab Nye and Rebecca F. Kuang. 

  • I recently completed a very challenging course in open-water diving, I’m now a certified scuba diver!

    While I can speak Arabic well, I’m learning to read and write in Arabic. 

    I’m learning/practising the derbakke (a Middle Eastern Drum played sitting, resting the drum sideways across one leg). 

    I am currently learning to play the Turkish nay.

  • Taking long walks by a river, diving into waves at the beach (even if it’s just for a few minutes), reading, snorkelling, travelling abroad to discover how different communities grow and make things and meet people, water colour painting, drawing, collaging (any art-making really), joking around with my family, and now scuba diving. 

  • In 2017, we lived in Izmir, Turkiye. Our family took a gap year to travel and volunteer with Syrians (who were made refugees) in Izmir. I learnt to speak Turkish, but it’s not nearly as good as my childrens’ Turkish.  

  • If it was up to my husband, we’d be living in something that continually moved on wheels or floats. I’m not sure about me, but I do value the idea of being a global citizen.