One Perfect Night - Available May 3

One Perfect Night is a short story (about 9000 words) set in Townsville, Australia, in 1943. 

In 1943, with the Japanese advancing through the Pacific, Townsville was on the front line. In 1942, the population of Townsville went from an estimated 30 000 people, to somewhere between 90 000 to 100 000. Schools were closed, and handed over to the Americans to use, as were businesses, cinemas, hotels and as many as 200 private homes. In one street alone, thirty houses were commandeered by the Americans to use as a hospital.  Slit trenches were dug in the main streets, and air raid shelters built. The airport, still in use today (and the only one remaining in Australia that is joint use between the civilian airlines and the RAAF), was built because of the war. 

Townsville is my home city now, I guess. I mean, there comes a point when you have to admit that if you haven't moved in over a decade, this could be it. When I was a kid, I moved a lot, thanks to my dad's job. One of the places we lived was Bougainville, an island in Papua New Guinea. The war was still evident there, in rusted-out tanks on the side of the road, in roads and bridges built by the military, and, on a jungle hillside, a large red cross marking where Yamamoto's plane was shot down. It was impossible to grow up on Bougainville and not be aware of the war, even if it seemed as strange and mystical to a kid as the tales of the spirits in the volcanos. 

It was in Bougainville that I first learned about the coastwatchers. The coastwatchers were men stationed on islands throughout the Pacific - planters and traders mostly - who, when the Japanese came, spied on their positions and reported back to the Allied Intelligence Bureau, based in Townsville. They were only a small group of men, but their impact on the Allied war effort can't be understated. They were the eyes of the Allies, behind enemy lines, and helped turn the tide of the war against Japan. 

Cover art by Natasha Snow

Townsville, Australia, 1943.

Tanner is a captain in the US Army, stationed at a radio post on an island in the middle of nowhere.

Nick is a coastwatcher, a man whose voice Tanner has only heard before over the radio waves.

They meet in the middle of war, when nothing is certain but this: Tanner and Nick are owed one perfect night.

One Perfect Night is available from Amazon and Smashwords.

Vanuatu

A month ago, Cyclone Pam devastated Vanuatu, and in particular the island of Tanna. Several years ago I was lucky enough to visit Tanna, and it's a beautiful, unique place with some of the most wonderful, welcoming people you could ever hope to meet. I can't even tell you how magical it was to lie in bed at night in total darkness (no electricity after 8 pm) and listen to the roll of the waves on the beach, only metres away, and, in the distance, the constant rumble of the volcano Yasur.  

For most tourists, Vanuatu is a another beautiful tropical destination. For my sister and me, it was a little more than that. Having spent our formative years in Papua New Guinea, sadly not a safe destination to visit anymore for the most part, Vanuatu felt a little like a homecoming. It was listening to a language we hadn't heard in a long time, similar enough to the one we'd learned as kids that we were still able to follow along. It was the smells of the marketplace, of fruit and fish and coconut oil and petrol fumes, that took us straight back to our childhood. It was seeing the Melanesian culture again, listening to the stories, and the songs, and reconnecting with old memories, and with magic. 

Here are some of my favourite photographs from that trip. 

This is a sand drawing of a turtle, done by the guide at the Cultural Museum. He drew this with his finger, in one continuos line, while telling us the story of the turtle.  

This is my nephew Tom, who was delighted to discover that the Tooth Fairy did find him on Tanna, and even paid him in Vatu instead of dollars! 

This is Tom and his sister Meg, forging through the shallows, looking for sand dollars. Collecting sand dollars became a thing for them. Every night we'd line them up in the bathroom, and Meg, who was still learning at that stage, would count them all. 

A red starfish and a green sand dollar. These were both in ankle-deep water in the lagoon, which was only a few metres from the units we stayed in on the main island of Efate. There were thousands of them. The bumps on the starfish were soft and almost velvety to touch. 

This is the view from the verandah of our bungalow on Tanna. The sand, which you can't see terribly well, is actually black, courtesy of the volcano. There was no electricity after 8 pm where we stayed. No television, no phones, and nothing to do except swim in the ocean, watch the horizon, and let the local kids practice their English on you. I was terrified I would be bored, but I have never been so relaxed in my life, and so sad about leaving a place. 

Tanna is a magical place. It's one of the few places in the world where cargo cults still exist, and we were lucky enough to visit a John Frum village and see the people celebrate their faith. 

If you want to know more about how to help the people of Vanuatu, please check out the Red Cross or your preferred charity for information. 

Islands

So, I was rereading The Island last night, and I remembered these photos I took last time I was in Vanuatu. Okay, so The Island is set in Fiji, but I haven't been there since I was a kid. I remember being there for the coup (I don't recall which one) and waving to the army guy with the machine gun as we went to the airport. He waved back. 

But any inspiration I picked up on the beaches in Vanuatu applies to Fiji anyway. Beautiful islands, beautiful beaches, and the endless glittering blue of the Pacific. 

On his Fijian island, Lee collects sand dollars. So did I, in Vanuatu, but for much nicer reasons. My niece Meg was learning to count, so during the day we collected sand dollars and lined them up in the shower at night for her to count. 

Remember how Lee finds a green sand dollar? Here's one, next to an orange star fish: 

And these things were literally metres from our door. Get up in the morning, walk outside, and head straight into the lagoon. 

And the water around Vanuatu -- so blue. 

Here is the bungalow we stayed in for part of the trip. If you think the sand doesn't look as white and clean as it should on a tropical island, that's because this was on Tanna, and the sand here is black thanks to the volcano, Mount Yasur. At night you can drift off to sleep to the sound of the waves breaking on the shore and, in the distance, the rumbling volcano. You can visit the volcano as well, if it's safe, and walk to the top and watch the eruptions. Just magical. 

So our bungalow wasn't five star accommodation like Shaw's...

...but who needs that when you have this view from the hammock? 

You guys, if you ever get the chance to go to Vanuatu, take it! It is one of the most beautiful places on the planet.  

***

Bragging time: I got an awesome review on Joyfully Jay for Dark Space. You can read it here.  Awesome reviews make me do a happy dance! You can see that h... no, no linking to that. I've still got my pride. Also, this particular happy dance was done in my oldest, shabbiest pyjamas. 

I'm very excited to tell you that my next novel, The Island will be coming out in the New Year, from Loose Id. It's set on a Fijian island that looks a little like this: 

Source

But it's not all sand and sunshine. In many ways, the tone of The Island is darker than Tribute, but I hope that you will fall a little bit in love with my two guys --  one, who tells himself he's there for the money  and everything else is none of his business; and the other, who knows from experience that the most painful thing in the world is hope. 

Here is the blurb: 

Shaw is in Fiji to sell a stolen painting to a crime boss. It will be the deal of a lifetime, if he can pull it off. He isn’t expecting Vornis to parade his latest toy around in front of him - a captured DEA agent whose time is running out. It’s none of Shaw’s business, and it doesn’t matter that under any other circumstances Lee would be exactly Shaw’s type: he’s young, he’s hot, and he might even have a personality if they hadn’t beaten it out of him. Too bad there’s no way Lee is getting off the island. Too bad there’s nothing Shaw can do for him. And too bad there are some lines that even Shaw won’t cross -- keeping his hands off Lee proves harder than he thinks, but Shaw’s not stupid enough to fall for the tortured captive of a dangerous crime boss. If he does, it won’t be just his job he'll be risking -- it will be his life. 

I can't wait to share the cover art with you! 

Sand Dollars

I am lucky enough to live on the Queensland coast, and to have travelled extensively throughout the South Pacific. When I needed a beautiful tropical setting for my current project, I looked no further than Fiji. And when I needed something for a character to collect off the beach, I thought immediately of sand dollars. They are both plentiful, and beautiful. 

Sand dollars are related to sea urchins and star fish. The beautiful flower-like pattern on the shell is actually their skeleton. When they die they are washed up onto beaches and are bleached by the sun. It seems miraculous to me that nature has produced something so geometrically perfect - although of course nature does this all the time! Sand dollars are lovely, fragile, and remind me of all the time I have spent in the beautiful South Pacific.