Radford College Collegian, Melissa Garside (Class of 1994) unveils her latest junior fiction adventure

Melissa started writing in kindergarten, with her first story featuring a pirate called Jim. Growing up she often wrote stories, family newspaper articles and plays for friends, and has been writing for fun ever since.

The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame was her favourite book as a child, but she also loved Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, Roald Dahl’s children’s books and the Anne of Green Gables series by L.M. Montgomery. She loved anything that sparked her imagination.

Melissa’s debut novel, Lexie Moon & The Word Burgling Bungle follows young inventor Lexie Moon and her gadget, The Vocabuliser. When a notorious thief seizes her invention, leaving people speechless, Lexie must race against time to retrieve it.

Her latest novel picks up Lexie’s inventive spirit and launches it even further into orbit. In Lexie Moon & The Space Day Disaster, Lexie joins her school’s Stargazing Club only to discover they never actually stargaze. Determined, she builds “The Stellascope” to make daytime star-gazing possible.

Readers can meet Melissa in person at a book launch event scheduled for 10:00 am on Saturday, 20 September at the Camden Library in Sydney. Attendees are encouraged to come dressed in space-themed costumes and can expect fun activities, giveaways, games, book signings—and, of course, a chance to chat with the author herself. Tickets can be purchased here: Humanitix.

We hope to have Melissa visit the College soon to present her book to our Junior School students.