June 2022 - Newsletter

June 1st – our first official day of Winter down here in the Southern Hemisphere – and there is already a light dusting of snow in the Alpine regions of Victoria and New South Wales.

When people think about Australia, they think of it as a vast desert country where its people live along the coastline, which is true. But there is a lot more to Australia than the desert. So, I thought I would touch on some things that always surprise people when they visit.

I cannot help but wax lyrical when I start writing about Australia. I often talk about how travel and place inspire a story. The snowfields are a wonderful place to get the creative juices flowing. Skiing through a white landscape surrounded by green eucalypt trees is quite uplifting—it is such a fantastic contrast to the burnt yellow colors of summer.

The names of our ski fields also have a real Aussie feel to them 😊 – like Dinner Plain, Falls Creek, Charlotte Pass, Mt Baw Baw, Perisher etc – not to be out done, we have runs like Wombat’s Ramble, Ruined Castle, Fanny’s Finish etc.

So, it does not matter where you go or what you do as a writer; something always presents itself which can turn into a story. I have yet to write a story set in the snowfields, although there is a chapter in Return to El Alto that takes you to Falls Creek in the Victorian Alps. It is lovely to write from experience. Those chapters show my hero William Landon, suffering from depression, using the ski slopes to blur his pain. Check out El Alto and Return to El Alto if you want a feel for Australia and Peru. So many experiences inspired those two books. Check them out on your local Amazon site.
 
Until next time
Suzie