Strange Objects collected in Messenger's scrapbook. Steven Messenger has several psychotic episodes and eventually kills Charlie Sunrise and a lizard in Strange Objects. The book was partly a response to Australia's Bicentenary, which occurred in 1988. This event caused a revival of interest in Australian history, particularly in the "discovery" of the land. The bicentenary celebrated the landing of the "First Fleet" in 1788, and the beginning of permanent European settlement in Australia. James Cook charted the east coast of Australia in 1770, however there were a number of sightings and landings prior to this. In "Strange Objects", Gary Crew takes the
Geological Society of London Phillips, and William Phillips. It received its Royal Charter on 23 April 1825 from George IV. Since 1874, the Society has been based at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London. This building houses the Society's library, which contains more than 300,000 volumes of books and journals. It is a member of the UK Science Council. In 1991, it merged with the Institution of Geologists, which had been formed in 1977 to represent the geological profession. The Society celebrated its bicentenary in 2007. It ran programmes in the geosciences in Britain and abroad, under the auspices of the science writer and palaeontologist Professor