Join us at Goonellabah Library as one of Australia's most loved television personalities appears live and in conversation with Kate Coxall of the Lismore App.

About the Author

Melissa Doyle is an award-winning journalist with more than thirty years’ experience. She is one of the most well-known and trusted people in the Australian media. As co-host of Channel 7’s Sunrise she covered such significant events as the Beaconsfield mine disaster, the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton, four Olympic Games, the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, the Queensland floods, Victoria’s Black Saturday bushfires, multiple federal and state elections, the inauguration of Barack Obama and the election of Pope Francis.

Melissa joined the Seven Network’s news team in 2013. She and the team were recognised with a Walkley Award, a Logie, and three international Edward R. Murrow Awards for their live rolling coverage of the Lindt Café siege. In more recent years Melissa has been a host and senior correspondent for the Seven Network’s flagship news and public affairs program Sunday Night, and narrated Channel 9’s Australia Behind Bars. She is currently filming This Is Your Life for Channel 7 and is the weekend breakfast host for radio station Smooth FM.

About the Book

In early 2020, for the first time in her life, journalist Melissa Doyle had trouble sleeping. Her 50th birthday was nearing, the show she anchored had been cancelled, and her eldest son was about to leave the country. The idea of a book about ways to cope with personal upheaval started to form in her mind.

Then the pandemic hit, and everything changed. All of humanity was feeling deeply uneasy and uncertain, and livelihoods, relationships and mental health were affected. Melissa found herself reflecting on some of the extraordinary people she’d met over the years—women and men who were able to find their way through the darkest of times. Could these inspiring people share how they were able to navigate their experiences and grief? So 15 Seconds of Brave was born.

Melissa shares the stories of eight incredible people, the events life has thrown at them and how they were able to get through their experiences: Meet Tonya, whose daughter killed her father; Grace, who was abducted into a life of slavery with the Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army—and forced to be a child bride to the man who killed her father; and Danny, whose three children and niece were tragically killed in a hit and run accident in Western Sydney. These brave men and women show how hope can prevail and we can all, as one remarkable little boy put it, find our "fifteen seconds of brave".

15 Seconds of Brave is a timely book and is released just one day before the Goonellabah event. Reserve it now on the library catalogue!

Contact the host of Melissa Doyle in conversation with Kate Coxall