Kate Lyons

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Kate Lyons |Blake Sharp-Wiggins

On Tuesday 20 May, as rain pounded Taree and flood waters rose, eight people wheeled a grand piano on its castors across one of the town’s main streets and into an office block. The piano, worth $20,000, was saved and still sits, nearly two weeks later, in the office with employees working around it. But much of the rest of the stock from Bass ‘N’ Blues Music Megastore – including 180 guitars, 80 amplifiers and $100,000 worth of sheet music – was destroyed.

1 week ago | msn.com | Kate Lyons |Blake Sharp-Wiggins

Microsoft Cares About Your PrivacyMicrosoft and our third-party vendors use cookies to store and access information such as unique IDs to deliver, maintain and improve our services and ads. If you agree, MSN and Microsoft Bing will personalise the content and ads that you see. You can select ‘I Accept’ to consent to these uses or click on ‘Manage preferences’ to review your options and exercise your right to object to Legitimate Interest where used.

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Kate Lyons |Blake Sharp-Wiggins

In a large field by the Taree greyhound track stands a huge pile of waterlogged and mud-caked waste, pulled from houses and businesses inundated by last week’s massive floods. Among the mound are couches, fridges and piles and piles of broken furniture. The heap represents the heartache and damage of the floods – people’s treasured possessions, and equipment they used to make their livelihoods.

1 week ago | msn.com | Kate Lyons |Rafqa Touma |Daisy Dumas

Microsoft Cares About Your PrivacyMicrosoft and our third-party vendors use cookies to store and access information such as unique IDs to deliver, maintain and improve our services and ads. If you agree, MSN and Microsoft Bing will personalise the content and ads that you see. You can select ‘I Accept’ to consent to these uses or click on ‘Manage preferences’ to review your options and exercise your right to object to Legitimate Interest where used.

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Kate Lyons |Rafqa Touma |Daisy Dumas

The Israel-Gaza conflict loomed over the Sydney writers’ festival long before it opened its doors at Carriageworks last week. In February, the chair of the festival board, Kathy Shand, resigned over her concerns about some of the programming related to Gaza and Israel. Robert Watkins, who replaced Shand as chair, promised the festival would present “a plurality of voices [and] a diversity of thought” including “both Jewish and Palestinian writers and thought leaders”.