What just happened?

It seems I've been absent for a while...

I wish I could tell you I had merely been kidnapped by aliens and am now back after 18month learning their ways, but sadly it was just disaster that beamed me up for a time.  I see that the the last time I posted, I was about to embark on a tour of America with 3 other crime writers.  That happened and was outrageously amazing... and I will post some about it in retrospect now that I'm back (to posting - not Australia... we've been back in the country for a fair while now).

We returned to find the entire East Coast of Australia was on fire, and the Prime Minister was in Hawaii. It was about a month later that the fires reached my hometown.  Batlow was declared "undefendable" and I evacuated leaving my husband and son behind to fight the inferno with the volunteer Rural Fire Service.  Our home was engulfed and the since then we've been rebuilidng and replanting.  I shall also post about that now that the immediate emergency is over.

And then there were hailstorms and floods which took finally dropped a lot of fire-damaged trees... across roads, rooftops and fences.  That too will be covered in retrospective posts.

And then of course there was... is the pandemic.  

I think I've been waiting for the punches to abate before I got back to a normal routine - updating websites, posting, life in general.  But I've decided now that waiting for calm is a fool's errand.  And so I promise I shall snatch time to exist here and to make the website vaguely current.  I might even redecorate...

Anyway, I know I'm not the only person in the world who was left reeling by 2020, and that many of you have endured much, much, more than we've had to.  I hope you're all okay, and that you can see light at the end of the tunnel.

Sulari xx

America or bust...

So... just a few days till we take off for the new world: three crazy weeks on tour through America with three (some would argue equally crazy) crime writers.  What could go wrong?  Soon the four of us will depart for New York and the adventure really begins.  Of course updating websites while we're on the run is difficult, but we did want to share the expedition as it happened and so we have consolidated and will be reporting back daily articles, pictures, footage, opinions etc to https://dailyreview.com.au/ and posting pictures and thoughts to Instagram @mysterywritersontherun.  So check in, follow our adventures in the US and if something goes awry please send someone to come get us!

         

And by way of reminder the tour schedule - if you're in the neighbourhood, come out and say hello.  We will explain Vegemite!

Links to Events:

Bouchercon

Poisoned Pen Press

Diesel - A Bookstore

Flintridge Bookstore & CoffeeHouse

Book Carnival

Noir At the Bar

Vroman's Bookstore

CAL Grant

Australia's Copyright Agency announced its Cultural Fund Create grants yesterday, and I found myself the very honoured, mildly astounded and extremely ecstatic recipient of a grant forf my latest project: a metafictional thriller called Letters From Leo, which was described as "a post-modern cross-cultural thriller that sets up stories within stories, entwining the narratives in a climax that can be read on many levels".  

It is the nature of a writer's life that rarely do we have the opportunity to write a book without feeling like we're stealing from our families so that we may do so.  Grants like this give artists and writers the opportunity to work without guilt - or at least with less guilt.  They hold the world at bay while we create.

It is an amazing and valuable gift and I could not be more grateful.

Tour itenary

Where you can catch up with us in the US!  Four very talkative Australians looking for conversation... and the occassional coffee...

P.S. Join us on tour on Instragram @mysterywritersontherun

Hit List - Crime Writers at the Wheeler Centre

My first ever appearance at the Wheeler Centre.