Susan Strafford

A multi-layered narrative drama about ordinary people and their struggles and joys with life. Blue Notes is composed of five tales about people who are "blue": a married man struggles by with depression; his son spends his days drifting; a young woman reacts to being abused by her partner; a heroin addict attempts to start a career in music; and a lonely man, bereft of family, looks for a way to connect with others.

A strange day begins for 18 year old Adam with a phone call from an old school friend. After several years without any contact, Luke is eager for a reunion. Bewildered, Adam sets off to meet up with his childhood mate. What follows is a sequence of interactions with Luke's family members, overlaid with a drug and alcohol binge. As the day progresses through a series of funny, sad and violent clashes it becomes clear that the stranger has little in common with the people he has been thrown in with. What all these characters do share though is an intense desire to be something more than what they are.

Ja'mie King, the self-promoting "queen bee" of Summer Heights High, returns from an exchange semester at that public school for her last three months at Hillford Girls Grammar, where she's the unchallenged diva among the school's most popular girls, as well as the school captain. Clothes, cars, boys, parties ... Ja'mie has it all, and her overriding goal is to win the Hillford Medal