Still to come at the end of this week, Desert Island Castaways Mary Metcalfe and Eliza Graham, whilst I am touring the blogosphere with THE GILDED LILY.
Have a look at my post on Passages to the Past, or the interview and Giveaway on Let them Read Books - Last Day to enter!
Meanwhile, I took some time out of my schedule to Interview Alison Stuart about her new romance GATHER THE BONES. I met Alison through the Hoydens and Firebrands blog where she invited me to join the other writers who are passionate about 17th century history.
Hi Alison, lovely to have you visit my blog.
Thanks for having me, Dee. Great questions!
What was the first story you wrote that you were
proud to have written?
I have been writing stories
probably since I could first hold a pen but my first “real” story was a school
assignment in Form 3. We had an English teacher of the old fashioned kind (she
wore a gown and tried desperately to drum grammar into our heads – on that
count she failed). I can’t remember what the assignment entailed but it
resulted in a ‘chapter story’ of a couple of thousand words called “The Stones
of Chichen Itza” – my first foray into an archaeological mystery. I was
inordinately proud of it (and the fact I had learned to use a Thesaurus in its
creation). I bound it in a brown carboard cover illustrated with a Mayan head
and I think it still lives in a trunk in the loft. Miss Robinson, who did not
give praise easily, was fulsome in her review. I fell in love with writing.
Gather the Bones is set in the
Great War. You and your husband both served in the Army Reserves, how did this
impact on your understanding of the War?
My interest in military history
probably stems from my father, who had been a career officer in the British
Army. When I met my husband – we were both doing officer training in the
Australian Army Reserve – I met my soul mate. Viewing the history of military
campaigns with an understanding of the military mind brings a different
perspective to the subject. When we lived in Singapore, to fill in those boring
Sunday afternoons, we retraced the Fall of Singapore, visiting the various
significant historical sites and reading the accounts. Our objective was to
determine if the result would have been the same if Percival had held out for a
little longer (we concluded - probably not).
D had been tracing his
grandfather’s history. The family had known that he had been in the second wave
at Gallipoli and had always assumed he had incurred his wound there. D
discovered through the archives of the Australian War Memorial that he has
survived Gallipoli and gone on to nearly two years in the trenches of the Somme. We found letters written to him while he was in
hospital from his mates and now have a very clear picture of his military
career. The result gave D a completely different perspective of his grandfather
and he became very interested in visiting the battlefields of the Great War,
which we did in 2005.
There is no doubt that the
visit had a profound effect on us both. We were in Amiens
for the Anzac Day commemorations and traced D’s grandfather’s war to the village of Pozieres. Standing on the hills looking
down into the valley of the Somme and looking
at it from the perspective of soldiers, not historians, gave the experience
some clarity. Soldier to soldier, we had a great and abiding understanding of
the foolish notions that turned the war into such a shambles.
Mercifully our own experience
was one of a peace time army.
Tell me a little about where your love of history
comes from.
Undoubtedly it came from my
father (see answer above). He loved history and had a way of bringing it to
life. He would take me to any “historical” film that was showing. As a child he
would read us his favourite novels (not all of which may have been suitable for
our tender ears) and I can still hear his beautiful, rich voice, transporting into
imagined worlds of long, long ago. One of the books of his choice was
DuMaurier’s The King’s General which instilled my passion and fascination for
the English Civil War period.
What is it about
the relationship between Helen and her cousin Paul that made them so
fascinating to you?
Unfortunately Australia had
not been discovered in the seventeenth century and I really wanted to create an
Australian character. The Great War is so deeply instilled in the Australian
psyche that writing Helen’s character gave me an opportunity to explore the
experience of D’s family history and the many, many hours I have spent in
reading and researching stories of the Australian experience of the First World
War. Helen’s freedom is such a contrast to Paul’s repressive upbringing and his
deep sense of honour and duty. I wanted to show them both as outsiders in the
dying world of Edwardian English society that we see in Downton Abbey. Helen
for being a mere colonial and Paul for being the poor relation and the wrong
man.
What is your greatest indulgence when
writing?
Fry’s Chocolate Cream. I have
discovered our local chocolate shop imports it from the UK so at vast expense I
reward myself, every now and then, with a bar. It is one of those taste
sensations from childhood that never goes away!
You work as a lawyer, do legal concerns make
an appearance in your writing?
Not if I can help it! In fact
it probably explains why I tend not to write contemporaries. As soon as I move
into a contemporary I find myself writing about lawyers. My military background
has had a far greater influence on my writing than my legal profession.
You have been involved for many
years with the Romance Writers of Australia. What does this network mean to
you?
I would never have been a
writer without Romance Writers of Australia. It was only be sheer chance I came
across them and from the moment I attended my very first conference, knowing
NOTHING about writing in general and romance writing in particular, I knew I
had found my tribe. I was fortunate to be President for a number of years and
have just seen the organisation grow from nearly folding to what it is today.
My dearest, dearest writing friends have come through this network. Only
writers really understand other writers.
Have you ever seen a ghost?
No...and yes. Not face to face
as it were but I have experienced what I can best describe as “sensations”. I
have found myself in places or situations where I have felt cold and what I can
only describe as a tight band around my chest. Only last weekend on a “ghost
tour” this happened to me and later the guide described the place where it
occurred as being a well documented haunted spot. This has happened to me
often enough now to recognise that there are indeed more things in heaven and earth...
Here are just a few quotations from the Autumn edition of The Author, the journal of the Society of Authors (UK). All were extracts from stimulating articles about the state of the writing and publishing profession today. I can highly recommend the organisation and its journal. More information and how to join at
