Author(s): Frances Cherry

Biography & Memoir

No one else’s mother stood on a soapbox in Courtenay Place on Friday nights, shouting things like, ‘The workers must take over the means of production.’ No one else’s father sold the Communist Party paper, The People’s Voice on Cuba Street. Could anything be worse than having parents who were well known communists in the 1940s and ’50s? 

Frances Cherry’s memoir takes us back to life in post-World War ii Wellington. Leaving school with no qualifications, Frances worked in factories, fell in love with lots of boys and found an outlet for her creativity in Unity Theatre, and later in writing. Marriage, five children and life in Paekakariki followed, along with successful publications, domestic betrayal and then divorce. Returning to Wellington, she found love with another woman, and later adventure through travel — not always plain sailing though.