Sue Barlow 
Hold the Ladder Steady 

Growing up in Australia in the early fifties, Robin is intrigued by the folklore of the pink boto told by her father. A childhood fantasy confirms her belief that like all fairy tales, there will always be a boto somewhere waiting just for her. Robin observes the conflicts of Roman Catholicism and the social changes of the sixties that swept like a tide into her adolescence. It was the age of the pill, the Vietnam War and good girls who still wore their hats to mass on Sundays. When she launches herself into life in the city with a man having a cowlick, she leaves the sea behind. New and old friends bring an awareness of the issues that confront Australia in a new age, when the complexities of feminism and sexuality were a thorn in the side of a country that prided itself on fair play.