The Penal Colony House

About the Book

“What exactly we were doing in a small town in Australia was a mysterious topic, even to ourselves.” The Penal Colony House is a diary of an American, married to an Australian, living in Bungendore, New South Wales, a town of 1,500 people, mostly farmers, forty-five minutes outside Australia’s pre-fab capital city, Canberra. Theoretically, the couple moved down under for six months to collect their $14,000 tax break from the Australian government’s First Time Home Buyer’s Grant program. Instead, they found the final outpost of the American Dream. In a series of humorous emails, The Penal Colony House not only offers a vivid account of an American living the Aussie way of life, but also provides intelligence from what might just be the last real Eldorado.

About the Author

Tom Piper is a New York City-based artist. He currently works for Checkerboard Productions as a documentary filmmaker. Forthcoming projects include films on global capitalism, world produce, and the history of handwriting. He lives with his wife, Chloe, in Brooklyn.