My Week, By Alison: and a Recommendation.Bubba pursues Johnnie Dowd in search of her magical summers, and Olive has to prepare for a new way of life without her beloved layoff season. Roo breaks the 17th doll in a fit of rage, and the pair leaves. Emma tells Roo and Barney that they can't stay in the house any longer. Olive asks for the 'perfect past sixteen summers' back and storms out of the house. He tells Olive that he's staying in Melbourne and that he wants to marry her. He says this season hasn't been any fun without Nancy. Barney asks Roo if he wants to join him and the other harvesters who are leaving to harvest grapes. Emma tells Barney that Olive is childish and they are all too old for the layoff season frivolities now. She explains that the items were breaking and she decided to put them into storage. The next day, Olive has removed all of the gifts Roo brought her, including the dolls. Barney throws a vase full of Olive's dolls at Roo. Roo implies that women find Barney inadequate in the bedroom, and Barney reveals that Roo never actually hurt his back.

Barney reveals that the harvesting team felt abandoned by Roo and that he was trying to mend their relationship. He accuses Barney of sucking up to Johnnie because he's the best harvester now. With their plans set, Johnnie leaves, and Roo yells at Barney for making him meet with his enemy while he was in his work clothes. Emma, Olive's elderly mother, also lives there. Olive has invited her coworker Pearl in Nancy's stead. Olive's friend, Nancy usually stays with Olive during the summer but was recently married. Olive is getting ready and her friend Pearl is talking with Olive's young neighbor, a girl named Bubba.

The play opens as the women of an old house in Carlton, Melbourne prepare for Roo and Barney to arrive from Queensland.

The prequels detail the beginning of the summer traditions and have many of the same characters. The play is considered to be the third in a trilogy with two prequels, Kid Stakes and Other Times. Angus & Robertson first published the play in 1955. It is the 17th year that Arthur 'Barney' Ibbot and Olive's boyfriend Reuben 'Roo' Webber have come to stay with her, but this summer proves to be less care-free than the others. Set in Melbourne, Australia in 1953, Summer of Seventeenth Doll by Ray Lawler tells the story of Olive Leech's tradition of summering with two sugarcane cutters during the layoff season.

Summer of the 17th doll