Leaving Paradise

My Expat Adventure and Other Stories

By: Sonia Harford

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Paperback | 3 October 2025 | Edition Number 1

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In this entertaining and thoughtful personal investigation, Harford explores the boom in Australian expatriatism-the ideals, reality and dislocation of being an Australian living abroad-and the often heart-wrenching decision to return home.

Sonia Harford hooked one of the biggest assignments of her journalistic career when she covered Milosevic's war crimes trial in The Hague. Like many other Australians who move overseas to live and work, Harford was on the journey of her life.

Leaving Paradise is in part the story of Harford's five-year expatriate adventure in Amsterdam and Rome. It also investigates the experiences of a host of other Australians including best-selling author Peter Carey, East Timor human rights campaigner Katrina Langford and lawyer and deputy registrar at The Hague International Criminal Tribunal, John Hocking. Frank and intimate interviews reveal why they-like almost one million of their compatriots-have uprooted their lives, families and careers to join the global community.

In this entertaining and thoughtful personal investigation, Harford explores the boom in Australian expatriatism-the ideals, reality and dislocation of being an Australian living abroad-and the often heart-wrenching decision to return home.

Regardless of whether you're a business professional, artist, waiter or student, this book is an exploration of the glamour and the grumble, the lure of the bewitching big city and the pain of nostalgia.

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You Can Find This Book In

Non-Fiction Biographies & True Stories Biographies Travel & Holidays Travel Writing

Cast adrift : Sonia in the Netherlands	p. 9
Tough love : birth, death and marriage	p. 47
Rights of passage : John in The Hague	p. 61
For love alone? : Angie in London, Steve in Berlin	p. 83
Portrait of the artist as an expat : Peter Carey in New York	p. 103
Che Bel Biondo : Sonia in Rome	p. 125
Friends : leaving, and being left	p. 149
Swept away : Katrina in Indonesia	p. 157
Families at anchor : Lorna, Chris and Judy in Australia	p. 169
Far from retiring : Sue in the Balkans	p. 183
Re-living paradise : Sonia back in Australia	p. 193
Migrants all	p. 213
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.

Leaving Paradise

My Expat Adventure and Other Stories

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