Although lots of people have contacted me to say how much they enjoyed No Killing Sky (see Reviews page) it’s great to see the book finally getting a good review from a ‘formal’ source. The SMH/Age are Australia’s most prestigious mastheads so I’m pretty chuffed. Just waiting for the New York Times and Washington Post reviews now!
Most committed readers, I have no doubt, have their favourite bookshops. Sanctuarys that they feel have something special, some indefinable quality that sets them apart. A large part of this is the books, of course, but it’s more than that. My sister, I know, swears by Berkelouws in Cronulla south of Sydney. One good friend favours the Constant Reader on Sydney’s lower north shore, while another insists you can’t do better than Gleebooks. In Sydney’s … Read more…
Two fairly significant things happened to me at the end of March. On the 27th and 28th the slow moving and deeply destructive Category 4 Cyclone Debbie scored a direct hit on our home at Queensland’s Shute Harbour. On the 29th we crawled from our cyclone sanctuary to find the world around us battered and shattered. On March 30th – while I was trying to clear a path to the street, waist deep in green … Read more…
From the moment a would be novelist clicks open that first bright white screen-page and keys in a working title, he or she has a pretty good idea what lies ahead. Most likely, many months, perhaps even years, of solitary slog, of Herculean effort; writing, re-writing and re-writing again. If the writer is committed enough, or perhaps just stubborn enough, to complete the work, he or she will know that when, eventually, they key in ‘The … Read more…
Why would a writer who lives in the north of Queensland set the opening of a novel in the west of Ireland? The first chapter of ‘No Killing Sky,’ my recently published novel, kicks off in County Kerry, above a valley nestled in the shadows of the magnificent Macgillycuddy’s Reeks. There is a reason for this, although reason may not be the right word, given the decision is far more intuitively based than it is … Read more…
Given that this is a ‘book’ site I guess I’d better say something about books. Currently I have three other novels itching to be published. The first is complete and set largely in Ireland’s spectacular county Mayo. The second travels the length of the Silk Road and is about two thirds of the way to completion. The third stretches from Australia’s tropical north to the bleak mining villages of south Wales and it’s about halfway … Read more…