Martin O’Donnell’s debut novel took four years to write. Photo: Oliver Jacques.
The former chief financial officer of the iconic Griffith Producers business has unleashed his creative side and released his debut novel.
The self-published Jono and Jake: Going Bush explores the friendship between two teenagers who come from vastly different backgrounds.
“It’s about an elite private school city boy Jonathan Newmont, who comes to the country on an exchange to Bourke,” Mr O’Donnell said.
“He’s shocked about what they do and how free they live. Ultimately, he becomes part of the group.
“You’ve got a group of boys who play sport together, they go camping together and interact; the city boy gets brought in and is impressed at how the boys all have each others’ backs, which is different to how things are in Sydney.”
While the book explores elements of the city-country divide, the author says it’s not aimed at making political statements.
“It’s not saying what Jonathan does is wrong or what the Bourke boys do is right. It’s just about adapting to a different environment and understanding their way of life … boys who have fun down at the river,” he said.
The 63-year-old is an accounting graduate who once rose to second in charge of the co-operative Griffith Producers, which stored and sold fruit and vegetables between the 1920s and the early 2000s. The stretch of land on Banna Avenue from where the business operated is still known as ‘Prod Straight’ and is now where used cars for sale are paraded.
Denis Lorenzi outside the 107-year-old doors to Griffith Producers cool room where he was placed as a baby. Photo: Oliver Jacques.
Griffith Prods is perhaps best known for saving lives during a heatwave in January 1939, when temperatures exceeded 49 degrees Celsius, leading to the death of 113 people across south-east Australia. In an era before air-conditioning, patients at Griffith’s hospital and at-risk babies were placed in the Griffith Prods’ cool room to keep them alive.
Mr O’Donnell worked at Griffith Prods in the 1980s and 1990s and is proud of his time there, but is now enjoying the change of pace that semi-retirement and writing for pleasure brings him.
“The funny thing is I don’t read much. I do a lot of bushwalking, and I was out walking one day and this idea came into my head. I thought, ‘Why not give it a go’. I started when COVID was happening, things were quiet and I had time to write,” he said.
“I think it’s a book that people who don’t read that much will enjoy. It’s not too complicated.
“There’s a lot of message about working in groups and city versus country. Someone who is 16 or 17 can read the book and really enjoy it and probably wouldn’t get the undercurrents, but someone who is a bit more mature who reads it might think, ‘I see what you’re saying.’”
Mr O’Donnell also did the photography for the book cover and spent four years working on his passion project.
“I did about four or five drafts. The first draft I wrote I just kept typing. But when I went through again I made a lot of improvements. Then I got a few friends to read it, who gave me some feedback … by the time I got to the final version I was pretty happy. I also added chapter names.”
Now that he’s got a taste for writing, he won’t stop. He’s already planning the sequel.
“In the first term of the year, the city boy came to the country. In the second term, the country boy will go to the city. There’s some unfinished business from my first novel that will lead into the second,” he said.
Jono and Jake: Going Bush can be purchased on the Amazon website.
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