Dorothy Porter was one of Australia’s most charismatic and courageous literary figures. Achieving broader fame through her bestselling queer crime verse novel, The Monkey’s Mask, and its film adaptation, she took poetry and performance to new heights.
Her younger sister, Josie McSkimming, watched Dot become an award-winning poet, but it was a family of complex dynamics. Born to renowned barrister Chester Porter, Dot, Josie and their sister, Mary, grew up in an unpredictable family home on Sydney’s northern beaches. Each forged her own impressive career, but Josie and Dot sought very different escapes from their formidable father. Josie fell into (and out of) evangelical Christianity and psychotherapy while Dot found ‘the Arts’ and sex.
With unprecedented access to Porter’s personal diaries and letters, Gutsy Girls is an intimate story of sisterhood, finding creative power and blazing your own trail.
Sydney Morning Herald, Saturday Melbourne Age
Josie McSkimming is a social worker, psychotherapist, university lecturer and author. She is the youngest of three sisters, her eldest being the award-winning poet, Dorothy Porter. Josie has appeared on many podcasts, radio programs, and on ABC TV. She is committed to social change and social justice and has become an ardent amateur naturalist and environmentalist. She was once an insider of evangelical Christianity, until she became a loud protesting outsider. Josie lives in Sydney.
Her most recent book is 'Gutsy Girls' (2025) UQP, a family memoir of her late sister, the trailblazing queer writer, Dorothy Porter. Josie has this to say about the book.
"Many things have happened in my life that I never believed could happen. First, I left the evangelical church, reconstructed my sense of self and refused to accept the requisite identity of a ‘good Christian woman’. I now even provide therapy for those who have experienced religious and spiritual trauma. Then I wrote a book about my family that has broken many of the taboos I grew up with. I have told my own story of growing up with family violence and its impact on me and my sisters. I have also told the story of my relationship with my sensational big sister Dorothy Porter in much more frank terms than she would ever have expected or even dreamed of.
And most unbelievable of all is that she died 16 years ago. It still shocks and startles me that she is gone.
And so here is the book that I never fully believed I could get published.
A story of sisters."
Her previous book is 'Leaving Christian Fundamentalism and the Reconstruction of Identity' (2016) Routledge, about how identity changes when people leave high demand religious churches and communities.
