Sue Brierley is nervous. Today the final draft of her manuscript goes to the printer and the implications of baring heretofore very private details of her life are playing on her mind. Sue is the mother of Saroo Brierley, the Indian boy whose story travelled even more widely than he did, first as the bestselling memoir, A Long Way Home, and later as the 2017 motion picture, Lion. In fact it was Saroo who convinced his mother that she too should write a book.
“My son came up with this idea,” she explains. “I really wouldn’t have undertaken it otherwise … I’ve always kept my cards very close to my chest. So, until they read this book, a lot of people in my life will have had no idea about my story.”
Even people who know her well? “Yes,” Sue admits. “It’s going to be traumatic. I’ll feel deceitful in some ways, but it was too hard to talk about.”
Her son Saroo’s odyssey was heart-wrenching. At five years old, while out adventuring, he fell asleep on a train which travelled the breadth of India to the seething city of Kolkata. There, Saroo lived by his wits, sleeping under bridges and on railway platforms, until fate delivered him to an orphanage. Attempts were made to find his family but Saroo was young and could not pronounce the name of his village. His family was but a speck in a population of close to a billion people, so he was declared an orphan. Fortuitously, he was adopted by Sue (played by Nicole Kidman in the film Lion) and John Brierley (played by David Wenham) and grew up in their neat suburban home in Hobart, Tasmania, before tenacity and modern technology helped him to find his way home.
This story is from the December 2020 edition of The Australian Women's Weekly.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the December 2020 edition of The Australian Women's Weekly.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Hitting a nerve
Regulating the vagus nerve with its links to depression, anxiety, arthritis and diabetes - could aid physical and mental wellbeing.
Take me to the river
With a slew of new schedules and excursions to explore, the latest river cruises promise to give you experiences and sights you won’t see on the ocean.
The last act
When family patriarch Tom Edwards passes away, his children must come together to build his coffin in four days, otherwise they will lose their inheritance. Can they put their sibling rivalry aside?
MEET RUSSIA'S BRAVEST WOMEN
When Alexei Navalny died in a brutal Arctic prison, Vladimir Putin thought he had triumphed over his most formidable opponent. Until three courageous women - Alexei's mother, wife and daughter - took up his fight for freedom.
The wines and lines mums
Once only associated with glamorous A-listers, cocaine is now prevalent with the soccer-mum set - as likely to be imbibed at a school fundraiser as a nightclub. The Weekly looks inside this illegal, addictive, rising trend.
Jenny Liddle-Bob.Lucy McDonald.Sasha Green - Why don't you know their names?
Indigenous women are being murdered at frightening rates, their deaths often left uninvestigated and widely unreported. Here The Weekly meets families who are battling grief and desperate for solutions.
Growing happiness
Through drought flood and heartbreak, Jenny Jennr's sunflowers bloom with hope, sunshine and joy
"Thank God we make each other laugh"
A shared sense of humour has seen Aussie comedy couple Harriet Dyer and Patrick Brammall conquer the world. But what does life look like when the cameras go down:
Winter baking with apples and pears
Celebrate the season of Australian apples and pears with these sweet bakes that will keep the midwinter blues away.
Budget dinner winners
Looking for some thrifty inspiration for weeknight dinners? Try our tasty line-up of low-cost recipes that are bound to please everyone at the table.
