 At one point, to prove to his family he had ended his problems with alcohol, Jolly cut off part of a finger.He began writing poems and short stories, mostly for children, two books of which, "Adrift at Sea" and "Spirit of the Bush", were published in 1932.Alexander Jolly began working in real estate again in the 1930s on the New South Wales South Coast until the Second World War, but he never returned to architecture.