Publication day – Would you like a dash of sunshine with your noir?

My new Olivia Grace teen PI novel, ‘Trouble is my Business’ comes out today – hooray! It’s the second in my teen mystery series set on the Gold Coast, and in Byron Bay.

Most people who read crime fiction are familiar with Nordic noir, also known as Scandinavian noir. It’s all about dark deeds in cold countries with morose detectives. Think ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ or ‘Miss Smilla’s feeling for Snow’. 

‘Trouble is My Business’ is pretty much the opposite of that. It’s not Nordic noir, but sunshine noir. In teen PI, Olivia Grace’s world everything is fun and colourful on the surface, but rotten underneath. The sea is sparkling, but dark deeds are afoot.

Olivia might not be treading the mean streets of urban California like Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe, or Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Millhone, but her beat has its share of both glamour and grunge.

As in the Florida crime novels of Carl Hiassen and Elmore Leonard, the happy holiday exterior provides cover for a seedy underbelly. Florida has been called a sunny place for shady people, and this could be said of the Gold Coast and Byron Bay as well. An eclectic mix of real estate developers, tourists, and eco-warriors can lead to a whole lot of trouble.

In ‘Trouble is My Business’, as Olivia gazes out at the sparkling blue sea in Byron Bay, she muses that people would, quite literally, kill for this.

Brisbane launch:

‘Trouble is my Business’ will be launched by Kay Kerr, author of ‘Please Don’t Hug Me’ at Where the Wild Things Are, in West End, Brisbane, on August 19th, 6.30pm. This is a free event, but bookings are essential. Click here to register.

Here’s the blurb …

Olivia Grace, recently retired teen PI, has her priorities sorted. Pass first-year law, look after her little sister, and persuade her parents to come back from a Nepali monastery to resume … well, parenting. But after Olivia’s friend Abbey goes missing in Byron Bay, she can’t sit back and study Torts. It’s time to go undercover as hippie-chick Nansea, in hippie-chic Byron Bay: hub of influencers and international tourism, and home of yoga, surfing and wellness culture, against a breathtaking backdrop, a short drive from Olivia’s Gold Coast home.

Olivia’s looking for answers, with the help of her stash of disguises, the PI skills her irresistible ex-boss Rosco taught her … and a nose for trouble. Her suspects include a hard-core surfer who often argued with Abbey in the surf, a charismatic cult leader and an acrobatic botany student. And then there’s Rosco, officially assigned to the case, and proving impossible to avoid.

Lisa Walker’s second Olivia Grace novel is another rip-roaring excursion into madcap sunshine noir, with nods to Nancy Drew and Sherlock Holmes, and a flavour of Veronica Mars meets Elmore Leonard.

Goodreads

Add ‘Trouble is my Business’ to your to-be-read list on Goodreads.

Order

Order ‘Trouble is my Business’

Early reviews

‘I loved being swept up in this mystery. A wonderful combination of comical, high-stakes and genuine.’ 

Emily Gale, author of ‘We are out with Lanterns’

‘New mystery, new trouble, new(ish) normcore clothes… Forget Sherlock Holmes and Nancy Drew, teen PI Olivia Grace going deep undercover as Nansea is everything I never knew I needed. 

Fearless, fun and fake tanned, has Olivia found the perfect disguise in Nansea to take on cults, bad boy surfers and dangerously attractive acrobats? 

Trouble is my Business kept me reading, guessing and laughing late into the night.’

R.W.R McDonald, author of ‘The Nancys’

‘I am here for a brilliant young protagonist who’s solving mysteries and showing up for herself. A page-turning read.’ 

Claire Christian, author of ‘Beautiful Mess’

‘Hilarious, tender and fun, this sun-drenched teen PI mystery drips with humour and style. I adored it.’ 

Poppy Nwosu, author of ‘Taking Down Evelyn Tait’

‘Trouble is my Business’ Book Launch

My second Olivia Grace teen PI novel, ‘Trouble is my Business’, comes out on August 1st! It’s had some lovely early reviews and I’m pretty excited about it.

I’m thrilled to be launching ‘Trouble is my Business’ as a Byron Writers Festival satellite event on Saturday August 7th, 6pm. Kayte Nunn, bestselling author of ‘The Last Reunion’, will be doing the honours and it should be a fun evening. It’s a free event, but click here to book on Eventbrite.

Here’s the blurb …

Olivia Grace, recently retired teen PI, has her priorities sorted. Pass first-year law, look after her little sister, and persuade her parents to come back from a Nepali monastery to resume … well, parenting. But after Olivia’s friend Abbey goes missing in Byron Bay, she can’t sit back and study Torts. It’s time to go undercover as hippie-chick Nansea, in hippie-chic Byron Bay: hub of influencers and international tourism, and home of yoga, surfing and wellness culture, against a breathtaking backdrop, a short drive from Olivia’s Gold Coast home.

Olivia’s looking for answers, with the help of her stash of disguises, the PI skills her irresistible ex-boss Rosco taught her … and a nose for trouble. Her suspects include a hard-core surfer who often argued with Abbey in the surf, a charismatic cult leader and an acrobatic botany student. And then there’s Rosco, officially assigned to the case, and proving impossible to avoid.

Lisa Walker’s second Olivia Grace novel is another rip-roaring excursion into madcap sunshine noir, with nods to Nancy Drew and Sherlock Holmes, and a flavour of Veronica Mars meets Elmore Leonard.

Goodreads

Add ‘Trouble is my Business’ to your to-be-read list on Goodreads.

Pre-order

Pre-order ‘Trouble is my Business’

Early reviews

‘I loved being swept up in this mystery. A wonderful combination of comical, high-stakes and genuine.’ 

Emily Gale, author of ‘We are out with Lanterns’

‘New mystery, new trouble, new(ish) normcore clothes… Forget Sherlock Holmes and Nancy Drew, teen PI Olivia Grace going deep undercover as Nansea is everything I never knew I needed. 

Fearless, fun and fake tanned, has Olivia found the perfect disguise in Nansea to take on cults, bad boy surfers and dangerously attractive acrobats? 

Trouble is my Business kept me reading, guessing and laughing late into the night.’

R.W.R McDonald, author of ‘The Nancys’

‘I am here for a brilliant young protagonist who’s solving mysteries and showing up for herself. A page-turning read.’ 

Claire Christian, author of ‘Beautiful Mess’

‘Hilarious, tender and fun, this sun-drenched teen PI mystery drips with humour and style. I adored it.’ 

Poppy Nwosu, author of ‘Taking Down Evelyn Tait’

My very first video

Video-making has never been on my radar. I’m a writer, not a filmmaker, after all. I’m lucky to have a son who’s a filmmaker, and he’s made me some great book trailers over the years. There really hasn’t been any need for me to learn to do it myself.

But then, this social distancing thing came along and all of a sudden, I couldn’t do bookshop visits, or talks to schools and other groups. I noticed other writers doing amazing videos, and I wanted to do one too, but… I had no idea where to begin.

So, when The Lismore Regional Gallery and The Quad offered an at-home artistic residency called Together//Alone, I thought this might be just the spur a movie-making novice needed to have a go. I applied to make a video called ‘Writing the Girl with the Gold Bikini’. A short time later, I found out my application was successful. After I finished celebrating, I realised I had only seven days to make my video and freaked out.

I’m not exactly a technophobe, but I’m coming from a fairly low base. Step one was to figure out how to use iMovie. I discovered some great templates and spent way too much time checking them out. I also spent a lot of time pondering different approaches to capturing vision and sound with the equipment I’ve got available. I didn’t want to lash out on new gear. In the end, I filmed with a phone and tripod and used the microphone from a pair of headphones tucked into my shirt. It worked okay, but I think next time I’ll invest in a microphone and upload a teleprompter app. Live and learn.

I was super-proud of my first attempt. I sent it to my son, and he said, ‘It’s um… good’, but the way he said ‘good’ made it sound like ‘bad’. Apparently, all my transitions between film clips were terrible. Secretly, I already knew they were terrible, but I was hoping no-one would notice. I went back to work.

The final result is here – a six-minute video where I talk about the inspiration, setting, character and development of ‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini’. I feel like a kid bringing their artwork home from school. It might not be amazing, in fact I am well aware that it has some technical issues, but I did it all by myself! My next video can only be an improvement.

If you’d like to read ‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini’ , it is available at your favourite bookshop, or in print here and ebook here.

Interview with Dee White, author of ‘Beyond Belief’

Today, I chat to Dee White, who is the author of many works of fiction for kids and teens. Dee’s young adult novel ‘Beyond Belief’ has just come out with Scholastic. Welcome Dee!

LW: Where did the inspiration for this story come from?

DW: I was researching another manuscript set in Paris when I stumbled across the true story of Muslims at a Paris mosque who saved Jews during WW2. I knew I had to write about it. I received a VicArts grant through Creative Victoria to spend a month in Paris doing further research. It was amazing. My father fled Austria during WW2 after Kristallnacht. His parents were married in a synagogue and although he wasn’t raised Jewish, he was forced to wear a badge labeling him as a Jew and report regularly to the police. He and his family fled for their lives in 1939 and my father had talked about this to me. So I could relate this experience to my main character, Ruben fleeing from the soldiers and French police in Paris.

LW: Tell me about your protagonist, Ruben. Did he come to you easily, or did he take a while to get to know?

DW: Ruben, my protagonist in Beyond Belief did come to me quite easily. He’s a mix of my oldest brother who was always very gentle and serious and fair, and also trusting. I have two sons and they are very much like that too. They are kind to people and anticipate that they will receive kindness in return. I remember when they were around Ruben’s age and discovered that the world didn’t always work that way and I wanted to capture this vulnerability in my main character. My eldest son has always been a cat whisperer so incorporating this trait in Ruben’s character was quite organic. Ruben was very strong in my head and heart from quite early on. In fact he became almost like another one of my children.

LW: This is your second young adult novel, and you have also written several books for middle-grade and younger readers. What are the challenges and pleasures of the young adult genre for you?

DW: The lines between middle-grade and YA seem to be becoming more and more blurred. To be honest, I thought that Beyond Belief was middle-grade but booksellers seem to be putting it in the 12+ category, I guess because of the themes and also Beyond Belief is YA in length, but then so is Harry Potter and that’s considered middle-grade.  I never think of my writing in terms of genre or readership age. I just write the story I want to tell. I don’t consider my work to be classic YA (even my novel, Letters to Leonardo) and I’d find classic YA hard because I don’t write romance well and I feel like I’m a bit out of touch with the language and lifestyle of older teens. I guess that’s one of the challenges of writing YA. In YA your main characters are the same age or older than your readers but middle grade allows you more flexibility. As long as your main character is a similar age to the reader, you can have other characters who are older or younger, like Daan and Momo in Beyond Belief.

LW: Tell me about your writing process. Are you a plotter or a pantser and what is your writing routine?

DW: I’m quite erratic when it comes to writing process. Different manuscripts seem to call for different methods and each one is like a new experiment, an opportunity to try different things and acquire skills and knowledge that will make my writing better. I used to plot a lot but then I found my narrative lost its spark so now I tend to do a mixture of both. I know what my story is about and roughly what’s going to happen in the end, but not necessarily how my character will arrive at this place. I like to let them guide the story. As their character emerges, what they do and how they react to things will drive what happens next in the story.

When my boys were small I used to get up at 5.00am so I’d have around an hour to write before my kids got up. That way I could focus on being a parent and still feel like I was a writer as well.

Nowadays I tend to treat writing like a day job and work to fairly standard hours. It’s easy to just keep writing and write all day every day, but I’m trying to get balance in my life so I take weekends off and read at night. It can be hard to write when you’re the parent of young children or have a day job, but even if you can snatch just ten minutes a day it will still make you feel like you’re a writer and keep you motivated. Even when I’m under time and other pressures, I always try to keep my writing fun.

LW: Can you give us a sneaky preview of what you’re working on next?

DW: Eddy Popcorn’s Guide to Parent Training, my illustrated MG (Ben Johnston’s pics are hilarious) comes out with Scholastic Australia on 1 May and I’m currently working on the follow up, Eddy Popcorn’s Guide to Teacher Taming, which will be out next year. I’m also researching a couple of historical fiction works and a paranormal thriller screen play.

DW: Thanks so much Lisa, for inviting me to visit your blog.

You can find Dee online at:

Website, Twitter, Facebook

And buy ‘Beyond Belief’ at a range of booksellers, including:

Booktopia, and Angus and Robertson

Interview with Poppy Nwosu, author of ‘Taking Down Evelyn Tait’

In these strange times, it’s hard for authors to get out and about so I’m going to be posting some interviews with authors of new releases. First up, is Poppy Nwosu. Poppy’s second young adult book, ‘Taking Down Evelyn Tait’ has just come out. I’ve read it and found it funny and heart-warming and just the type of book we need to be reading right now!

Poppy Nwosu

Poppy had a chat to me about her novel, the writing process and what she’s up to next…

LW: As this is your second novel, did you suffer from the dreaded ‘second-book syndrome’?

PN: This is a strange one, because although Taking Down Evelyn Tait is my second published book, it isn’t the second one I’d ever written, so I was pretty used to working through stories by the time I came to write this one.

On the flipside though, even though it wasn’t technically my second novel, YES, I totally suffered from the dreaded second book syndrome!

I wrote this one just before my debut was released, but already I had it in my head that there might be a potential audience for the book and I think that is what really held me back and made writing this story, at times, utterly excruciating … I had kind of stopped writing for myself, and was instead writing for an imaginary audience (that didn’t even exist yet!). And I was sure that imaginary audience was judging every word I put on the page.

It meant I couldn’t have fun with my story because I was so nervous about what other people would think of it.

I ended up having to stop and restart the entire manuscript, and this time, I wrote it exactly how I wanted to, without worrying what anybody else would think. It really helped and the words flowed so much more easily and I started having fun again!

LW: Where did the inspiration for this story come from?

PN: I always feel like I shouldn’t say this, because I am a writer and obviously I adore books, but really what drew me to writing was my love of stories in any shape or form, including movies and television. So basically, what I am saying is I am a massive film and television nerd, and I am often so inspired by the stories I watch (as well as read).

I was watching a fun English show called Misfits, which has a character that was very likable, but who had absolutely no filter, said the worst (most filthy) things in the world, and was constantly a trouble magnet who always did the wrong thing. I loved the balance of writing about such a flawed character, but also making them very loveable at the same time.

That was really the initial seed for my main character, Lottie, who is a troublemaker but, hopefully, a lovable and charming one, and the rest of the story really grew from there!

LW: Lottie is a great character, did she come to you easily, or did she take a while to get to know?

PN: She came really easily, despite the story itself being a very difficult one for me to write!

I had such a fun experience writing Lottie. I think part of that is a level of wish fulfillment for me, I really enjoy writing very assertive and ‘out there’ characters simply because in real life that isn’t exactly my personality. I used to be very shy when I was younger and I still really hate confrontation, so it is fun to walk in another’s (more confident) shoes through my imagination. And once I started writing the first draft, I found it really easy to find Lottie’s voice. She’s actually one of my favourite characters I’ve ever written!

LW: Tell me about your writing process. Are you a plotter or a pantser and what is your writing routine?

PN: I started out as a complete pantser, but over time as I write more manuscripts, I have learned a bit more about plotting. The danger for me though, is that if I spend too long thinking through every detail of a potential plot or characters before I begin writing a manuscript, I tend to get a bit bored with that story. And I then want to move on to a new shiny idea instead of writing the one I have started plotting.

For me, I always have a vague idea of the characters and how they fit together, a tiny bit of the plot (usually a few scenes I want to write towards, though I have no idea how I will get there) and a very strong sense of the book’s tone and atmosphere and setting. The characters just seem to unwind as I write, and usually turn out quite different to what I thought I was going to do. I never really know the ending when I begin the book.

Writing like that seems to work for me, but it took a long time to figure out what was best. A lot of trial and error.

In terms of routine, it has all changed for me in 2020. I used to work full time, so I would squeeze in two hours of writing time every morning at 5am before heading into work, but this year I have dropped back to working only three days, which gives me a lot more time! It has been wonderful! I still get up at 5am and do my morning writing sessions, and then on my two weekdays off, I just continue working at my desk for most of the day.

LW: Can you give us a sneaky preview of what you’re working on next?

Yes! I was lucky enough in 2019 to be awarded an amazing trip from Writers SA (my local writing centre) to Varuna the Writer’s House to work on a new manuscript. I had the most amazing time writing all day every day, and am really excited about the manuscript that has come from it.

I can’t say too much about it yet, but it is a romantic contemporary YA with a lot of emphasis on the romance. It’s got a bickering hate to lovers trope, and is centred around a road trip, a lost nana and a damaged friendship. I really hope people will like it!

Find Poppy online: Instagram Website

Buy ‘Taking Down Evelyn Tait’ from Wakefield Press

Surfing the words to the shore

Surfing at Cape Arid National Park, Western Australia

Writing a book with a surfer-girl heroine has made me reflect on the relationship between surfing and writing in my life. One of my favourite authors, Haruki Murakami, has famously said that everything he knows about writing he has learned from running. For me, it’s surfing.

My surfing and writing journeys both started when I moved to the north coast of New South Wales. The surf was at my doorstep, it seemed a shame to waste it. My hometown is world-famous for its waves. A looming basalt headland captures the big swell and a rocky reef creates smaller waves on the inside. With such waves at my doorstep, what else could I do but buy a surfboard?

So I bought myself a beginner’s surf board – soft and fat. Each time I took it out I challenged myself to stay in the water for a little longer. I floundered around in the whitewash, falling off and getting pummelled by the waves, emerging with nostrils full of saltwater and hair caked in sand. But then I started catching little waves. I glided over the reef. I was hooked.

For twenty years now, I have surfed almost-daily. If I count it up, allowing for times when I was away from home, or the surf wasn’t happening, by even a very conservative reckoning this is thousands of hours immersed in the water.

My process of learning to write was somewhat similar. I got less sand in my hair and water up my nose but the slap downs were still painful. With both writing and surfing, you need to be able to take a pounding and come back for more. It takes hours and hours of thankless practice. You are going to wipe out. Get used to it. I wrote three complete novels before I got my first one published. That’s a lot of words. A lot of practice. A lot of rejections. Every writer and every surfer is different. Different doesn’t mean wrong. You can learn from others, but there’s no point in trying to copy them.

You need to go out as often as possible, no matter the conditions. Some days are good, others not so good, but as long as you keep turning up, you will get somewhere. Once in a while everything goes right. The waves are perfect. The words flow. Those days are rare, but oh so beautiful.

Both writing and surfing are more about the journey than the destination. You don’t surf with the aim of getting to shore. Nor does it make sense to focus on the outcome – the book, rather than the process of getting there. That’s where the magic is. There is always another wave on the horizon, another story to tell.

The Girl with the Gold Bikini is available at your local bookshop, most are now doing deliveries, as well as online at:

Wakefield Press, Booktopia, Readings, Amazon Australia, US, UK

Location, location, location – why Byron Bay is a perfect crime setting

Setting is important in crime novels. Where would Sherlock Holmes be, without the fog-bound London streets? And wouldn’t Scandi-noir be way too cheerful without those long, cold snowy nights?

Byron Bay might not be quite so noir, but it is still a fascinating location. In my new young adult comedy/crime novel, the beauty and the weirdness of the bay become almost another character in the book.

My protagonist, Olivia Grace, is a Gold Coast girl – They could have scrawled ‘here be dragons’ on the map south of Coolangatta as far as I was concerned.

The first time she went to Byron, she thought it was paradise:

Byron Bay, I soon discovered, was a place to conjure dreams. The sweep of the bay to the base of the mountains; the dolphins leaping from water so clear it was barely there. For us, it was nirvana.

But nirvana had a dark side and things didn’t turn out so well back then. Now, Olivia is back. A freshly hatched Private Investigator, she is hot on the trail of a yoga guru who’s a bit of a creep.

Here’s a whistle-stop tour of the mean streets of Byron as trodden by Olivia in ‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini.’

A Byron Bay Yoga Studio

I read recently that Byron has the highest percentage of yoga instructors outside India. Even if that’s not true, it’s believable. Things heat up for Olivia when she heads out to a fictional yoga studio, Lighthouse Bliss:

I park among the bangalow palms and make my way past the flowering lily pond to reception. The usual South American panpipes are playing and lavender wafts from an aromatherapy burner.

Despite this auspicious welcome, Oliva soon discovers that Byron Bay yoga is not for the fainthearted:

Ajay’s Bikini Beach Body Boot Camp Speed Yoga is powerful stuff. Each two-hour class covers all the moves other yoga teachers would take two weeks to fit in. He learnt this form of yoga from an Indian guru, who granted him sole worldwide rights. I guess gurus aren’t what they used to be.

Unfortunately for Olivia, things only go downhill from here…

Ah, Wategos…

Olivia trails the creepy yoga instructor to a large house with an infinity pool, overlooking Wategos Beach.

As I wind past the cabbage tree palms to Wategos, Abbey’s voice is in my head. ‘How good is this place, Ol? Surf and rainforest. It’s paradise.’ Byron Bay is still paradise. Seems like the whole world thinks so too, though.

Despite the crowds, I still think Wategos is possibly the most beautiful beach in the world. Surfing beneath the lighthouse as the sun sets over the mountains is one of life’s magical moments. Which brings me to…

Surf’s up…

One thing you can almost guarantee about Byron is… crowded surf breaks. Olivia used to surf, but she gave it up after a bad experience. Now she’s trying to get back into it again.

I’d forgotten how cutthroat it is out here. One of the men in the line-up is a kind of man-fish thing. His hands are the size of flippers and he gets onto the waves with about two strokes.

The pack takes my measure quickly. Every time I paddle for a wave someone else comes in from in front or behind or materialises out of nowhere.

Hot tip, Olivia – if you want to avoid the crowds, you need to surf in the dark. Which, in due course, she does. And after a surf, where would you head, but…

The Pass Café

For a post surf snack, this has to be the best spot in town.

A bush turkey roams around underfoot while the magpie cocks its greedy eye at a muffin. In Byron, the rainforest, with all its wildlife, comes right to the beach. Jacq and I claim a table with a view of that show-off, the sea.

Mm, and after a coffee, it’s time to move on to…

Jonson Street

At the risk of sounding like our Prime Minister, how good is Jonson Street? You could watch the world go by all day and never get bored.

The pavement is teeming with the usual frenzied mix: hippies down from the hills, European backpackers, spiky-haired Japanese surfers and gold-sandalled blondes in white linen beach wear.

And when you’re ready for some entertainment, there’s always…

Byron RSL

Several years ago, I did Mandy Nolan’s stand-up comedy course, culminating in a performance at the Byron RSL. The experience was so nerve-wracking, I had to get Olivia to re-live it for me…

Sipping a beer, I perch at a table down the back where I can take photos without being noticed. It’s open mike comedy night and she’s just taken the stage. The crowd is a mixture –young hip surfies mingled with your typical middle-aged RSL drinkers.

And of course, a novel set in Byron Bay wouldn’t be complete without a trip to…

The Lighthouse

A northerly wind whips at our hair and flattens the surf to whitecaps. Panting, we look over the cliff edge and see two dolphins, a mother and a calf, below us. I imagine them as the slackers of the dolphin world. ‘I can’t be bothered catching fish. Let’s get takeaways tonight.’ If I was a dolphin, that would be me.

Now that I’ve scoped the town, I can confirm that Byron Bay is the perfect setting for a fictional crime. Particularly if you’re into that of the yoga and surfing variety.

‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini’ is available from your friendly local bookshop, or: Readings, Booktopia, Amazon Australia, US, UK

Four of my fictional female detective crushes

In honour of International Women’s Day tomorrow, I’d like to give a shout-out to the fictional female detectives who inspired my own teen PI, Olivia Grace.

Olivia’s PI crushes …

Nancy Drew – The first Nancy Drew book was published in 1930. Since then, there have been over 500 books, five films, three television shows and a number of computer games. It’s safe to say that Nancy is a bit of an institution.

My Nancy Drew collection

Nancy Drew is one of Olivia’s role models.  Her grandmother gave her her first Nancy Drew book when she was ten and followed up with more volumes at every birthday and Christmas thereafter. As Olivia says:

‘Ever since, I’ve imagined myself roaming the streets, helping out the good guys, bringing down the bad guys. Wiggling out of scary moments with some girl-power ingenuity. Nancy Drew has style and chutzpah, not to mention a snazzy sports car. I have none of these, but what the hell. There’s nothing to stop me trying.’

Veronica Mars – Veronica Mars is an American teenage mystery drama, which first aired on television in 2004. Veronica is a sassy smart-mouthed heroine, who has also taught Olivia a lot. Despite watching the complete series of Veronica Mars, however, Olivia isn’t quite sure if she’s going to cut it as a real PI…  

‘Rosco can’t expect a super sleuth on my salary, but a girl who’s learned all she knows from Nancy Drew and Veronica Mars might not be what he had in mind either.’

Veronica Mars

My own PI crushes …

I have always liked a gutsy, fast-talking PI heroine who gets herself into and out of messes with panache. Here are two more of my favourites.

Corinna Chapman – Nimbin-born baker and reluctant PI, Corinna lives life with gusto. She is featured in the seven Earthly Delights books created by Kerry Greenwood. Kerry is also the author of the Phryne Fisher mystery series, now immortalised in the movie Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears.

Stephanie Plum –  Stephanie Plum is a character created by American author Janet Evanovich. She is a bounty hunter, described as a combination of Dirty Harry and Nancy Drew. The author has said she is “incredibly average and yet heroic if necessary.” There are 24 Stephanie Plum novels, plus a movie.

There is no shortage of fabulous female detectives in fiction and drama today. My own PI, Olivia Grace, might not have a magnifying glass like Nancy Drew or a long-lens camera like Veronica Mars, but she’s still ready to do whatever it takes to solve her case. She’ll even disguise herself as a meter maid in a gold bikini if she really has to.

Who are your favourite female detectives in fiction?

‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini’ is now available from your favourite bookshop and online locations including Booktopia, Readings and Amazon (Aus) (US) (UK). Read reviews on Goodreads here.

Ah, those Gold Coast days…

Well, this book has been a loo-ong time coming (what’s fifteen years or so, between friends?). It’s been so long, in fact, that I’ve published five other books, while I’ve been working on it. Some books take longer than others to find their perfect form.

So here it is – release day! It’s been worth the wait. Thanks so much to Wakefield Press for steering this book to publication and to my son, Tim Eddy, for the little video.

I thought I’d post a short extract here to whet your appetite. There is so much of my teenage self in this book – ah, those Gold Coast days…

***

‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini’

Chapter One:

Whenever I see a girl in a gold bikini, I think of Princess Leia. Here on the Gold Coast, gold bikinis are common, so I think of Princess Leia a lot.

Princess Leia doesn’t stand for any nonsense. When the giant slug made her wear that ridiculous bikini, she whipped out her chain and gave it a thrashing. Then she changed quick smart into something more sensible.

Dance with the hottest crowd in town, our stunning waitresses will ensure …

Punching the radio ‘off’ button, I squeeze my car into a metered spot near Cavill Avenue and glance at my watch. Late again. The good thing about working in Surfers Paradise is that the meter maids will be along soon to stick money in the meter. That’s if they don’t recognise my parents’ bombed-out Daihatsu, in which case they’ll know I’m no tourist, but a shameless leech on the system.

I jog up the street, jumping sideways to avoid getting wiped out by a guy with a nine-foot surfboard on his head. A tout calls out from a doorway, gesturing towards his shop. Get your stuffed koalas, didgeridoos and Akubra hats here, folks. Or that’s what I imagine he’s saying. As I don’t speak Japanese it’s hard to be sure.

I nod at the tout. He nods back. Seiji’s All Australian Souvenir Shop and Outback Bar is my regular lunchtime haunt. I don’t buy much but it’s always quiet in there, compared to the hustle bustle of the street. Seiji is nice. He never seems to mind if my ice-cream drips. He’s a good salesman, too.

As I push through the door of Gold Star Investigations I pause to savour the thrill it gives me. Here I am. Straight out of school and already a private investigator in training. It’s funny, though, how when dreams come true they’re never quite what you expect.

I hadn’t thought it would be so hard to work with Rosco. He and I are no strangers. We grew up on the same street in Southport. He was one year ahead of me in school, but we hung out together after hours. Rosco was Luke Skywalker and Han Solo to my Leia. We took turns to play Yoda, and very accomplished in Yoda-speak we were. The force was with us. I misheard this phrase the first time he said it, before I watched the movies, and the horse is with you became our little in-joke.

***

‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini’ is available in all good bookshops and online at retailers such as Booktopia and Readings.

You can read more about the book here.

I’m doing a few events around the place to celebrate the book’s release. You can check them out here. I’ll post more as they come up.

YAY!

2020 Events

February 13: Book Launch for ‘The Girl with the Gold Bikini’

When: 6pm, Thursday 13th of February

Where: The Bookroom at Lennox, 2/60 Ballina St, Lennox Head

RSVP: lennox@thebookroomcollective.com

February 29: Sisters in Crime, Brisbane

When: 12pm

Where: Brisbane Square Library

More information: Here.

March 12: Romancing the Stars

When: 6-9.30pm

Where: Iona College Library, 85 North Rd, Lindum QLD

Bookings: Here.

More events to come…