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Callie's Castle
Nothing is going right for ten-year old Callie - she has fought with her best friend, her sister and brothers torment her, and the new house is a letdown. She longs to see Grandpa Cameron who lives on the other side of the city, so that he can put things right - which is exactly what he does.
89 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1974
3 people are currently reading
51 people want to read
About the author
Ruth Park
83 books113 followersRuth Park was a New Zealand-born author, who spent most of her life in Australia. She was born in Auckland, and her family later moved to Te Kuiti further south in the North Island of New Zealand, where they lived in isolated areas.
During the Great Depression her working class father worked on bush roads, as a driver, on relief work, as a sawmill hand, and finally shifted back to Auckland as council worker living in a state house. After Catholic primary school Ruth won a partial scholarship to secondary school, but this was broken by periods of being unable to afford to attend. For a time she stayed with relatives on a Coromandel farming estate where she was treated like a serf by the wealthy landowner until she told the rich woman what she really thought of her.
Ruth claimed that she was involved in the Queen Street riots with her father. Later she worked at the Auckland Star before shifting to Australia in 1942. There she married the Australian writer D'Arcy Niland.
Her first novel was The Harp in the South (1948) - a story of Irish slum life in Sydney, which was translated into 10 languages. (Some critics called it a cruel fantasy because as far as they were concerned there were no slums in Sydney.) But Ruth and D'Arcy did live in Sydney slums at Surry Hills. She followed that up with Poor Man's Orange (1949). She also wrote Missus (1985) and other novels, as well as a long-running Australian children's radio show and scripts for film and TV. She created The Muddle-Headed Wombat series of children's books. Her autobiographies are A Fence Around the Cuckoo (1992) and Fishing in the Styx (1993). She also wrote a novel based in New Zealand, One-a-pecker, Two-a-pecker (1957), about gold mining in Otago (later renamed The Frost and The Fire).
Park received awards in Australia and internationally.
Winner of the Dromkeen Medal.
During the Great Depression her working class father worked on bush roads, as a driver, on relief work, as a sawmill hand, and finally shifted back to Auckland as council worker living in a state house. After Catholic primary school Ruth won a partial scholarship to secondary school, but this was broken by periods of being unable to afford to attend. For a time she stayed with relatives on a Coromandel farming estate where she was treated like a serf by the wealthy landowner until she told the rich woman what she really thought of her.
Ruth claimed that she was involved in the Queen Street riots with her father. Later she worked at the Auckland Star before shifting to Australia in 1942. There she married the Australian writer D'Arcy Niland.
Her first novel was The Harp in the South (1948) - a story of Irish slum life in Sydney, which was translated into 10 languages. (Some critics called it a cruel fantasy because as far as they were concerned there were no slums in Sydney.) But Ruth and D'Arcy did live in Sydney slums at Surry Hills. She followed that up with Poor Man's Orange (1949). She also wrote Missus (1985) and other novels, as well as a long-running Australian children's radio show and scripts for film and TV. She created The Muddle-Headed Wombat series of children's books. Her autobiographies are A Fence Around the Cuckoo (1992) and Fishing in the Styx (1993). She also wrote a novel based in New Zealand, One-a-pecker, Two-a-pecker (1957), about gold mining in Otago (later renamed The Frost and The Fire).
Park received awards in Australia and internationally.
Winner of the Dromkeen Medal.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 3, 2022
Best book ever the storyline is amazing her getting the castle is awesome
July 1, 2022
I lived for many years in Neutral Bay, on Sydney’s Lower North Shore, in an old timber cottage not far up from the harbour.
This suburb is an inspired setting for Ruth Park’s warm and understanding story: full of history, so named because the bay was an official safe haven for sailing ships of any flag to make repairs and restore their sea-worthiness. Kingsford-Smith once landed the Southern Cross there. The place is full of old houses grand and modest.
More grand than my small house, Callie’s home has a second story and above that a cupola long disused and accessible only from below, through a forgotten trap door. Callie is ten years old and she needs a peaceful private refuge from the tumult of school, friends, her boisterous and annoying younger siblings and the pain of a tragic loss. Callie is materially and emotionally aided by her grandfather, a semi-retired builder, fortuitously, able to renovate the cupola, and an empathetic step-father who, also fortuitously, is a house painter.
The location is carefully drawn, the house itself is a significant presence, the characters are good people without being cloying, as you’d expect from Ruth Park, and the story of pre-adolescent emotions, a young girl grappling with her past and looking to her future, is still relevant even if the story, published 50 years ago, has aged a bit.
My favourite photo of Ruth Park is her writing at the kitchen table with her toddlers playing underneath. The illustrations for Callie’s Castle are by Kilmeny Niland, Ruth Park’s daughter.
This suburb is an inspired setting for Ruth Park’s warm and understanding story: full of history, so named because the bay was an official safe haven for sailing ships of any flag to make repairs and restore their sea-worthiness. Kingsford-Smith once landed the Southern Cross there. The place is full of old houses grand and modest.
More grand than my small house, Callie’s home has a second story and above that a cupola long disused and accessible only from below, through a forgotten trap door. Callie is ten years old and she needs a peaceful private refuge from the tumult of school, friends, her boisterous and annoying younger siblings and the pain of a tragic loss. Callie is materially and emotionally aided by her grandfather, a semi-retired builder, fortuitously, able to renovate the cupola, and an empathetic step-father who, also fortuitously, is a house painter.
The location is carefully drawn, the house itself is a significant presence, the characters are good people without being cloying, as you’d expect from Ruth Park, and the story of pre-adolescent emotions, a young girl grappling with her past and looking to her future, is still relevant even if the story, published 50 years ago, has aged a bit.
My favourite photo of Ruth Park is her writing at the kitchen table with her toddlers playing underneath. The illustrations for Callie’s Castle are by Kilmeny Niland, Ruth Park’s daughter.
March 12, 2009
When I was ten, I was OBSESSED with building myself a house. No, that's wrong, what I wanted was a box. Four walls, a door, a window, and room enough for me and a book. For months and months and months I agonised over how I'd achieve this. Bricks? Wood? And what kind of decoration? (I thought a blue and white gingham, country-style kind of theme would be nice.) In the end, I gave up (it was physically painful, knowing that I'd never have it) and found myself instead a fallen wattle tree to sit and sway and read in. I remember most the grey sky fringed by dying, dark green wattle leaves, and leaning back against a branch that was almost comfortable but not quite. It became my castle!
Anyway, the point is, I'd thought this obsession was unique to me. I'm so glad it's not! Every girl needs her castle.
Anyway, the point is, I'd thought this obsession was unique to me. I'm so glad it's not! Every girl needs her castle.
September 24, 2011
I am reading this to my 7 year old now. It is the first book that I can remember buying. Well Nanna purchased it for me from Coffs Harvour bookstore. I love this book. Sydney is described so beautifully...a shimmering emerald.
My 7 year old is not so enthralled. The language is so different from what we use today. It was only written in 1974 - was that so long ago? The character's 'quarrel'. The language is....quaint.
Re-read it and love it.
My 7 year old is not so enthralled. The language is so different from what we use today. It was only written in 1974 - was that so long ago? The character's 'quarrel'. The language is....quaint.
Re-read it and love it.
September 20, 2025
Lovely little story. For me, the writing is remiscient of Narnia (especially the Magician's Nephew) when the children are in the real world, which was nice and nostalgic.
July 25, 2021
A story that highlights the emotional sensitivity of children as they get closer to their teenage years, and the need for their own independence and space. The Australian feel definitely came through in Park's choice of words, and even though this was written only as far back as the mid 70's, it was clear that the Sydney of that time has now moved on.
April 24, 2022
I read this as a bedtime story to my 7 and 10 year old recently and was mesmerised by the storytelling- such unusual and powerful use of language
June 2, 2013
Beautiful little read for a 10-12 year old girl
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews