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Another in our Book Realities series of interviews with independent authors, where we discuss their books, their writing methods and what inspired them to be writers in the first place. In this episode we meet Robert Horne, an avid reader of fiction since childhood when he started on the classic novels his mother put in their bookshelves.

With a BA under his arm, he worked at many different jobs before spending sixteen years as a senior secondary teacher in English and Classical Studies. His first visit to south east Asia in 2008 developed within him a burning interest to write about that area.

His articles have appeared in the Sydney Review of Books, Mekong Review and journals of the Universities of Barcelona and New Delhi. He is the prize-winning author of two books of short stories and completed a Master of Arts in 2012, and in 2017 a Doctor of Creative Arts in Creative Writing. He is now a freelance editor of academic writing, as well as an interested gardener and grower of organic vegies. But it is the flame of fiction writing that still burns most strongly in him.

His novel, Made in Cambodia is a story set in the midst of the upheavals of a developing nation forcing its way into the 21st Century. Ex-Khmer Rouge cadres must live among their former victims, modernism challenges millennia-old spirit beliefs, and young women, who yesterday were destined to remain the centre of village life, today must leave to be factory workers or medical students. It may not be enough that two people are right for each other, the world must be right for them.

Robert was also a long list selection of the ARA Historical Novel Prize, for The Glass Harpoon.

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Another in our Book Realities series of interviews with independent authors, where we discuss their books, their writing methods and what inspired them to be writers in the first place. In this episode we meet EB Converse, (Elizabeth).

An author who is always searching for the silver lining—even when writing tough topics and painful truths. That, paired with her unique ability to find the high ground, gives her work an incredible perspective and a fresh twist. She’s a lifetime creative writer of multiple genres and disciplines and has an education in the arts and culture. She’s an NGO founder/director of an arts and cultural organization.

Living in sunny Southern California with her husband, along with her human neighbors she lives on a mountain side and shares the land with a mother bear, her two cubs and a deer family. When she’s not writing, EB enjoys walking and yoga (but not at the same time), traveling, creating art and engaging in thoughtful conversations.

Rosedust, her debut novel, is a modern, multi-cultural romance. As family ties and family lies twist and turn towards their climax, the life of a mother and a daughter will parallel through generations. Ultimately, the dust of the past must be swept away, the present reckoned with and the future… well it must be paid for.

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Another in our Book Realities series of interviews with independent authors, where we discuss their books, their writing methods and what inspired them to be writers in the first place. In this episode we meet Murray Hall, who was, by his own admission, an average student who muddled through thirteen years of schooling whilst maintaining his primary passion of riding a push bike. At eighteen years of age he packed a bag and his bike and went to Europe where, “all the best bike riders were”.

A wonderful career in the sport of Cycling followed. Riding professionally for sixteen years, he competed at the highest levels of the European Circuit, winning a prestigious championship of Berlin and on two occasions was crowned British National Champion. A multiple Australian Champion, he represented his country on many occasions including in 1974, when he was a double Commonwealth Games’ Silver Medalist.

The sport allowed him to travel the world extensively and he was based out of Belgium and Denmark for long periods. It was during his time in Belgium, living in and around the major battlefields of the First World War, that he also developed an interest in the life of a forebear, Many years later, following the death of Murray's mum, he discovered a raft of paperwork detailing the life and times of this same forebear, his Great Uncle Ernest Alfred Hall. His 5-year mission to uncover the details behind the paperwork resulted in, Walk a War in My Shoes. The Story of an ANZAC on the Western Front.

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Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.