Join us for the launch of Gabrielle Samson's captivating memoir, Dancers on the Sea. This poignant tale chronicles her experiences living on the remote island of Atauro, East Timor, during a time of great political and social change.
Dancers On The Sea
This story tells of a woman’s life on Atauro Island, learning its history and culture as she worked with the community to improve living conditions through education. The memoir shares the stories of some of the people with whom she lived in a time of great change.
During the final years of East Timor’s occupation by an Indonesian military regime that was challenged by a fierce resistance movement, Gabrielle – an Australian woman working at an Indonesian university – was asked by a Timorese village leader to help establish a kindergarten for his community. Supported by the university, Gabrielle agreed to spend six months on the remote and poor island of Atauro, to live in the community as the only Westerner in its harsh and often cruel conditions.
It doesn’t take long for Gabrielle to fall in love with the island, its people and an Indonesian co-worker, resulting in the following twelve years of her life being spent living on the island.
Dancers on the Sea is Gabrielle’s experience through six of those years as the little country of East Timor struggled for, and achieved, its independence and became Timor Leste
“A moving and insightful book of reality and compassion…beautifully told and deeply shared…”
- Lisa, Readalot Reviewer
Gabrielle Samson
Gabrielle, a writer of fiction and memoir, has won national prizes for her short stories and has co-written a radio play produced by the ABC. She has lived and worked in education and community development in Australia, Indonesia, PNG, Vanuatu and Timor Leste. Gabrielle now lives on a community nature refuge in southern Queensland where she writes, reads, listens to music and sometimes attempts playing it. She teaches Indonesian language, is a Warwick U3A tutor of a writing group and is a member of the Carindale Writers Group (Brisbane).
Gabrielle has a degree in Anthropology and English Literature and post graduate diplomas in Education and Special Needs Education. She taught in and around Warwick from 1980 - 1992.
Her memoir ‘Dancers On The Sea’ - Stories from Ataúro Island Timor Leste (1994 – 2002) - was published in October, 2023. The book was nominated for Qld Literary Non-Fiction Award 2024.