Birth, Death and Moments Between, a book by Nerin Naidu
Birth, Death and Moments Between is a collection of short stories about women: their struggle, strife, success and survival in an ever-changing world. The new release by Brisbane author Nerin Naidu spans multiple generations, continents, and cultures, giving words to those without voices and voices to those without words.
Nerin’s debut collection of short stories is brutally honest, sometimes painfully so, scattered with moments of joy, love, regret, hate, and desire – all the traits and emotions that make us human.
About Nerin
Nerin was born as a middle child to a fourth-generation South African Indian family.
While in University, Nerin found her two true passions: anthropology, learning about different cultural groups and creative writing, putting pen to paper and letting her thoughts run free.
Nerin graduated from the University of Durban Westville as a teacher. She studied further in South Africa, obtaining her Bachelor of Education.
“For only through education can you succeed,” reiterated her mother’s words, a teacher herself.
Nerin secured a position as a high school teacher and travelled during the school holidays, unknowingly captivated to remember the lives of people she encountered. She came to a crossroads that would determine the future course of her life.
Job opportunities opened up concurrently in both Canada and Australia. Nerin fell in love with Canada before she even stepped foot on the icy white ground.
She said, “Looking down from the aeroplane’s window seat at the snow-covered landscape below, I felt the calling of home. Stepping off the plane, the cold air that stung my nostrils and slithered into my lungs refreshed me like the very first life-giving breath of a suffocating neonate; the blanketed trees, seeking respite from the Summer’s heat, brought comfort to my scorched soul. It still does every time I’m blessed with the sight of the first purest of snowfall.”
Yet Australia beckoned to her louder and more robustly with an urgent, determined that she would call Australia home.
And so she did, immigrating to a sun-kissed, searing-hot rural town in Queensland.
Nerin continued to study while working as a teacher, completing her Master of Education from the University of Melbourne and another Master of Education in Guidance in Counselling from the University of Queensland.
Nerin dedicated her entire existence to those she loved most: her family and the children she nurtured daily as a special education teacher in Brisbane and later head and leader of a sizeable inclusive education unit at a private college, a department she started from the ground up.
She also volunteered as a grief and loss counsellor, listening to those who needed it most.
Happiness seldom lasts, as Nerin found, suffering a heart attack while assisting a student at work, followed by the tragic loss of her brother. She had a second heart attack as she navigated through the journey of a busy life.
Nerin believes she is the person she is today because of yesterday’s struggle. She pens her deepest thoughts and experiences, personal and those of others, that she encountered on her tediously long and, in reality, brusquely short journey through life.
Nerin is retired. She now volunteers to teach and present creative and expressive writing workshops using art and meditation.
Nerin feels an exhilaration in sharing stories that need telling, stories of significant and defining moments, for she is every woman: a mother, a friend, a daughter, a sister, a teacher, a cousin, an aunt, a wife chipped in places and sometimes frayed at the seams, but whole moving forward with a determined drive as life and love goes on.
Her debut collection of short stories, Birth, Death and Moments Between, reflects life as it happens.
Please visit her website for details of workshops and the availability of her book.
www.nerinnaidu.com
Birth, Death and Moments Between by Nerin Naidu is also available on Amazon Internationally.
