Second-Best Luck

Fancy retirement right across the globe? Learning to speak a foreign language (Australian)? Too easy; don’t be a wuss, mite! Herein, you will find travel, exploration, how not to buy a house, how to build a harpsichord; how to cope with a second hysterectomy, coronary bypass, two different and simultaneous serious cancers. No worries; she’ll be right, mite! Consider Orshtraya on differing scales; the conurbation that is Canberra; the 90-mile straight which is just a blip in the landscape driving across the Great Australian Bite, Mite; the deeply soothing silence of the outback.

Seriously, sport: this sometimes humorous volume is travelogue, retirement manual, and medical aid, all in one. It has a sporting chance of really helping anyone terrified with recent news of cancer or other really serious illness. We all need help.

Dr Gerloch retired in 1999 from a career as an academic and research scientist in the field of quantum chemistry at the University of Cambridge. He is an emeritus fellow of Trinity Hall. He and his wife, Gwyneth, have since lived in Canberra, Australia. In retirement, Malcolm has enjoyed garden design, house renovation, and learning to cook in several cuisines. In 2004, he constructed a dual-manual Flemish harpsichord for Gwyneth to play and to thank her for introducing him (so late in life) to the non-scientific literature of the nineteenth and twentieth century European and twentieth century American writers. At 79, Malcolm began writing both children’s and adult short stories, as well as the present account of retirement in Oz.