 So good evening everyone and welcome to tonight's A&U Canberra Times Meet the Author with Jane Harper. I'm Anna Creer and I review crime fiction for the Canberra Times. I'd like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet and for me and Canberra that's the Nana Won people. We pay respect to their elders past, present and emerging. I would also like to thank Colin Steele, the convener of Meet the Author, for facilitating tonight's conversation and Pamela Randers and Pam Macmillan, Jane's publishers. Tonight Jane and I will be in conversation for 35-40 minutes and then we'll go to questions that have been sent in by you, our virtual audience, and we'll close about seven o'clock. Jane Harper really needs no introduction. She's the multi-award-winning bestselling author of The Dry, The Force of Nature and The Lost Man. Her books have been published in 40 countries, which is extraordinary. Her first novel The Dry has been made into a major motion picture with Eric Banner and hopefully we can talk a little about that later on. Her first fourth book, The Survivors, was, oh dear, hang on, I'll get it there in the end, her fourth book. It's the background. The fourth book, The Survivors, I give up. It is, it's here in my hand. The fourth book, The Survivors, was released last week in Melbourne in lockdown and it is already top of the Australian bestsellers chart. It's an atmospheric and moving story of grief, guilt and adolescent relationships. So hello, Jane, and welcome to meet the author. Hi, thanks so much for having me. It's our pleasure, it really is. How do you feel about releasing a book in these strange times and not touring and not meeting your readers? It's pretty different. Normally when the book comes out, I get to go around to different book shops around the country and get that opportunity to meet readers, which is one of the best things I think. Writing is such a solitary endeavor and you spend a lot of time alone at the computer. It's nice. It always feels a lot more real when you actually get out there and meet people who are reading it and they're holding it in their hands. It feels a lot more like it's actually being published. It's a little bit weird doing it in lockdown. I still haven't seen it in a shop, but I see photos of it in shops elsewhere, so I know it's sort of out there. Having said that also, it's great to have had these virtual opportunities because it means you can reach maybe readers who wouldn't be able to come to a live event for geographic or various other reasons. Thank you so much for hosting this. I really appreciate it. That's good. You had a thousand at your launch, which is extraordinary too, really. We haven't got a thousand tonight, but you do have an audience. Now, let's talk about your book, The Survivors, in Tasmania. Why did you choose Tasmania this time? The setting is a really important part of the novels, and it's something I think about really early. As soon as I'm thinking about the real core of the plot and settled on an idea, I'm immediately thinking like, where am I going to set this? The core of The Survivors is this story set in a coastal small town with a really rugged seascape. I think Tasmania was a really natural fit for that. That was quite an easy choice, because I think it ticks all these boxes. It has a lot of those really small tight-knit coastal communities that rely heavily on tourism nowadays. It has that beautiful visual landscape that I wanted as well. It was a decision I made really early on. You've been praised a lot for your appreciation of the Australian landscape. One reviewer said that you make a fully-fledged character, and you yourself have said that places need to have a ring of authenticity. That's why you took your road trip before writing The Lost Man. What did you do this time? Did you go to Tasmania? What did you have to do before this place, Evelyn Bay, came into your head? I did the same as Exactly the same as I did for The Lost Man. I went to Tasmania and did an underground research trip, which is a really important part of the writing process for me. I like to do it at the same point in the novel. I spent a long time researching what I can from my desk, reading a lot about it and interviewing people on the phone, and getting a lot of the basic core knowledge I need to build this fictional, but hopefully recognisable Australian setting. Then I'm putting the plot together. I like to get a loose first draft completed, which allows me to spot those gaps in my knowledge. I can work out what things I'm still missing and what I need to know. It's also enough wiggle room still to rewrite or redirect things if I need to, depending on what I learn on my research trip. It's quite a focus trip and I know what I'm looking for. A lot of that is things like visually the setting, but also things like, I guess, what kind of things do people talk about when you speak to locals and what sort of their experiences are growing up maybe in a particular place. Also specific, so for example, in The Survivors is a diving scene, because Tasmania has quite a rich diving opportunities, which you can't get in a lot of other places in Australia and they have a lot of shipwrecks and things like that. I really wanted to include that element because I thought that was a really great aspect of the state, but I'm not a diver and I don't have the experience to write a scene like that without having done it. So I booked in to go diving in Tasmania and got to go down and just feel what that was like really. Everything like the wet suits they use and the safety talks and the sea life you can see and what a temperature the water is like and things like that. So it was really great. It's always so useful. I always come back with way more than I expected to get from these trips. And then it's a question of, I guess, Cherry picking the best of it to weave through the book. Well, that explains why that scene is so vivid because it really did read as if you'd done it. And that was one of my questions whether you had actually done the dive because it was so alive, so extraordinary. So, and actually, as I was saying, my friend, and she was very impressed with the way you've captured the coldness of the sea, the isolation, especially when the tourist season finishes, and as well as that the concept of living almost on the edge of the world with only Antarctica, down only Antarctica over the horizon. So I thought you might like to know that it's and the caves, the caves are so they're so vivid too. Are they based on on somewhere real? Oh, thank you. I think, you know, I mean the whole, you know, whenever I'm kind of building a setting like I absolutely try and, you know, use as much real life, you know, I guess real real life parts of the setting as I can, but then also to fictionalize it. So, you know, I want it to be somewhere where hopefully people who are, you know, familiar with Tasmania to any degree really, you know, recognize it and it has that kind of, you know, you know, yeah, authentic ring to it, but at the same time not recognizably any particular place because it feels really important when you're writing fiction to, you know, for me in a way to fictionalize that setting and be able to try and draw in all those little elements. So I'm really, yeah, I'm happy, you know, if your friends who's, who's from there, you know, recognize that that's great to hear. Thank you. Great. Anyway, the story, you tell a story from Kieran's perspective. Here's your main character. And he's still affected by his guilt from the past. Guilt seems to be a recurring theme in your novels. Would you like to comment on that? And on Kieran too. Yeah, sure. So the, for those of you who haven't read the book yet, it's told, essentially through the eyes of the main character who's the guy called Kieran Elliott, who is 30. And he, he has a partner and a young, very young baby daughter. And he grew up in this small town in Tasmania. And when he was a teenager, he made some bad decisions that led to sort of devastating consequences for him and his family. And he then moves away to go to university and kind of move on with his life. And to some degree has, you know, done that with, you know, a measure of success. But he's still, you know, he still sort of carries a bit of weight, this past experience. So he returns to his hometown to help his parents who are struggling for various reasons. And I think, you know, I really like, you know, what I think really like about his character is that, that's, I see of him sort of coming home, but as a sort of a different person with a little bit more maturity and a bit of hindsight, I guess, which allows him to sort of reflect on things that I think, you know, many of us have that experience of going back to somewhere, you know, that we were very familiar with or where we grew up. And, you know, the years have kind of changed you a little bit. And it maybe invites you to reflect on decisions you made or things you did or things you, you know, you thought to be true, that maybe, you know, with those extra years aren't quite as solid as you thought. And I think that's the real kind of, that was, that was a really interesting kind of Kieran's character to write about. And you can see the difference between him and his, his perspective from that of his two friends who have remained and who have remained in this small town and don't have the broader perspective. Evelyn Bay is a very, very interesting place. You have one of your characters say, in a place like Evelyn Bay, people know each other business. And another says, it's just like this, they need to be tight knit to work. Once the trust is broken, they're stuffed. So tell us about you. Can I say that the day after Kieran returns home, there's a body on the beach. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. There's a body on the beach. So tell us about the reaction of the locals to the murder, especially the difference between the men and the women. And also, the really quite remarkable role played by, I just want to get the name right, the Evelyn Bay Community Hub online. Yeah, so I think that was, that was something that was actually quite an interesting part for me to write, which was the reaction of the community when a body is found on the beach. And it was sort of, you know, I often talk about how sort of themes start to emerge as I'm writing, and they sort of start to present themselves rather than, you know, me setting out with a theme in mind when I start. And this was one point where I really, I thought like, you know, that kind of theme, I guess, of the difference between, you know, the experience men and women have in similar situations really started to emerge because, you know, I was writing about the reactions of people in the town to a body being found. It's people react very differently, you know, depending on who you are. So, for example, Kieran who's 13, you know, young and fit and, you know, he has no problem, you know, walking through town at night and just continue sort of living his life really, whereas his partner who's the same age, but you know, doesn't like to, she won't go on the beach anymore on her own, you know, so and, you know, and it seems like that I think that really kind of highlights, you know, people can have a shared experience, but their reactions and how it impacts them can be very different. And the surf and turf at the end of the beach, did you base that, that was so, it seems so real too with its lobster in shells on the side? Is that something you saw or is that pure imagination? I did see something similar to that actually on my Tasmanian road trip. I'm trying to remember where it was now. It was, it was, it was somewhere, we kind of stopped, stopped by the side of the road really, and there was, yeah, a restaurant which had kind of a sea life creature made our shells on the side, which I thought was a really fun detail. And it seems like that I guess that you like to kind of, a really good to kind of, you know, include those sort of small details that, you know, I think hopefully give a place to a little bit of character without, without I think overloading the reader, with a lot of, you know, a lot of detailed description is going to slow the story down. You want to kind of drop these things in, you know, so it sort of naturally builds a picture rather than force feeding it, I think. Yeah. Now Karen as well, because of his, of his guilt and what has happened suffers and you mentioned beyond blue in your acknowledgments. Can you tell us what you learned from consulting them about this, this condition? Absolutely. So what I mean is, like I was saying, so obviously, try and do like an underground kind of your physical research shit, but I think a really important part as well is to seek out experts in areas, you know, the areas that you're going to touch on to make sure they're kind of accurately and sensitively portrayed. And one of those was this kind of this ongoing sort of theme of grief and guilt and the impact that has on people's lives and in different ways as well again people react very differently to similar situations. And so I, I spoke to one of the lead clinical advisors from beyond blue, which is, you know, I think we all know as a mental health charity. And that was really fascinating and I learned so much from them. So I'm really, really grateful to them for kind of giving me their time. So I know they have like a lot of requests, but it was, you know, I think one of the key things was the sort of the, particularly with young men, the how easy it is to go off the rails and how, you know, focused. They often have to be to really, you know, make a conscious effort to, you know, to try and stay mentally healthy and to try and find ways through something difficult that aren't, you know, alcohol or drugs or self-destructive behavior. It's something that I wanted, you know, Karen as a main character, you know, has, has achieved to some degree. He has actually been able to sort of focus and try and push through a little bit. But at the same time, you know, returning home kind of naturally, I think, you know, we've all experienced that when you, you know, feelings in the past kind of resurface when you're in a familiar situation, and that's the case with him as well. And he's been very fortunate in his partner too. I mean, Mia is a very understanding young woman. I mean, she comes from the same town. She seems totally, utterly supportive. And her, her comments about the male relationships that, that are such an interesting, weird relationship, but I've taught, I've taught adolescent boys. I can see how convincing your, your adolescent boys are and how they interact with each other. And I just wondered what research you had done to, to create this convincing sense of these young men. Yeah, you know, I think with the, the young guys, a lot of that was just observation really. You know, I think sometimes when, you know, when I'm quite often I find myself having to write characters that I don't, I don't really, I haven't lived their lives personally. And, you know, the thing I would sort of try and, you know, focus on with that rather than focusing on kind of, I guess the differences between their, their lived experiences in mind is trying to focus on those shared things. So, for example, you know, as, you know, as young, I think young men and young women do have different teenage years experiences, but at the same time we all kind of know what it's like to feel a bit, you know, insecure at a party or a bit left out by your friends or a bit like you have to, you know, you have to maybe be a certain way to feel like you're keeping up with everybody. And I guess it's those sort of, those sort of experiences that kind of resonates on a pretty universal level. And the kind of things I try and focus on when I'm, you know, writing about someone that doesn't necessarily kind of, you know, I guess share my, my current lifestyle. Yeah. And then there's Verity, another strong mother. I mean, after the strong mother in The Lost Man, you've got another strong mother, a mother who has caught many different things. And you describe her brittle, the brittle phase of her constant unceasing, grinding strive for inner serenity. It's a beautiful sentence and it really does somehow up so well. And you also talk about her active listening, which she's, she has learned to do as a result of what's happening to her. So tell us a little about Verity and about her role in this story. Yeah, sure. So Verity is Kieran's mother who is still, you know, still relatively young for, you know, for a grandmother. But it's sort of weighed down by a lot of, you know, her, her, you know, experiences in the challenges she's facing, not least of which is her husband who was also a relatively young man, but has in the grips of quite advanced dementia, and has really lost to her in many ways. And I think that was, you know, that sort of, I guess, again, that theme of kind of, you know, grief and regrets surface in Verity in a different way than they do in Kieran. And that was one of the things that I want to sort of draw out this fact that people do have different reactions to things. And for Verity, she's turned very much sort of inward to, you know, self-help and support groups and, you know, and maybe, you know, on the surface seems fine in a lot of ways, but underneath is, you know, is struggling. Yes, she is. She is really. And then there's another character, rather lovely character, which is baby Audrey. And in your, you say you've based baby Audrey on your own little boy, your own baby Ted. So the question immediately popped into my mind, did you really have a baby and write this book at the same time? Yeah, no, I did absolutely. Which is, I don't know why I'm laughing, it was really hard. It was, yeah, so I have a four-year-old daughter as well. And then I had my second child, who's my little boy, in November last year. And so I knew early on, I knew I wanted Kira to be a father, and I knew I wanted to have this kind of family responsibility, both from above with his own father and from below with his new child, which I think, you know, any of us who've had children will remember that first baby is an absolutely, you know, the upheaval that Kira gives you. It was something I really wanted to kind of draw in. And so he has his baby daughter with him throughout much of the book. And so I was pregnant when I was writing this book, and I kind of finished that first draft I was talking about, and I submitted it for structural edits. And then that's the point at which I go on my research trip, when I've got the time to, I've got the opportunity to really sort of structurally edit it based on the research and the feedback. And so I gave birth, and I had to go to Tasmania at a certain sort of point. So I had this 12-week-old baby myself, where me and my husband and I, total adult, all went down. And so, yeah, a lot of the, you know, the scenes of Kira kind of sort of walking through the sand with the baby structure's chest is very much, you know, very much based on my own experiences, which I think, you know, I like to think help, you know, I gave it kind of a certain ring of authenticity, but yeah, it was, so baby Audrey was kind of, is a character quite close to my heart. And she certainly has a personality all of her own. She's not just a baby being carried around. She reacts and, anyway, when you read the book you'll see, oh, then there's two really interesting characters. And I want to talk to you about them for this. There's a reason, two reasons to talk about George Barlin. But the first one is his association with Sue Pendlebury, because that not only do they discover vital clues, but they're actually real people. And I was fascinated to read about this. So perhaps you could tell us how Sue Pendlebury and George Barlin, who are not a police detective or a writer, actually came to be in your story. Yeah, sure. So I was invited to speak at a fundraising lunch in Sydney. So it would have been last year, actually, yeah, last year, in native Bernados, the children's children's family charity. And as part of that, they asked if I would be willing to auction, auction a name to appear in a book which I was happy to do, because it's a really important course and it raises a lot of money for a lot of really important projects. So yes, so we had this auction and Sue Pendlebury, who I believe is an oncologist in real life, was the highest bidder. And she actually bought, you know, big on behalf of her son, who is George. But I thought Sue Pendlebury was such a great name as well that I offered to include them both, because I just thought, you know, I had those characters really sort of firmly in mind. And I wanted to, you know, I wanted to give them characters who I think have quite a lot of depth and a really important role in the story. So they seem like a really good fit. They're also outsiders, and it's fascinating to watch the reaction of the small community. So we would have to, if we wanted to be in one of your books or our name, we'd have to go to an auction. I think so, yeah, it's not something I give away lightly, I have to say. Because I think the names are quite important. And, you know, they, when you think of names of characters as well, it's sort of, you know, you need them to kind of reflect all kinds of things like the characters age, where they're from, what kind of, I guess, what kind of family they're in, like, you know, their first name has to match their surname, for example. You also need the names to be different enough that they're recognizable to the reader. So, you know, you don't want names that are too close together in sound or, you know, letters. So that when the reader's reading, especially if they're reading fast, they kind of get that instant recognition, and they can attach their names to that character quite easily. So I find names like quite, you know, thinking names takes up quite a lot of time, and I sort of go through quite a few different variations before I settle on them. So, I was, I was, it says not something, yes, it's not something I give away lightly at all. And, you know, and I was, I was, I was lucky, I think, that Sue and George had such, you know, I thought really, really good names for fiction. And they fit in really well with the story. And let's, let's talk about George, because George is an interesting character in many ways. It has been suggested that, in fact, George is you, and that you've placed yourself, you've placed yourself in the story, because he's an ex journalist, as you are. And he's a bestseller to accept his bestsellers are quite different to the books you write. And you have him say some quite interesting things like, for instance, he says, I only take criticism from people I go to for advice. So is George you are is, is our elements of George you in this story. I think there are definitely elements of me. Although I would probably say there are elements of me and probably all the characters because you know they have to come from somewhere and that somewhere is essentially, you know, my own, you know, my own thoughts, my own experiences. I mean, with George, probably the likeness is maybe a bit more pronounced into he is as you said, like he's an author. He's a former journalist. And he, you know, so I suppose there are times when I think his thoughts of mine do, you know, align quite closely. That being one of them that, that, you know, create you just pulled out there. But I think I'm, you know, with all the characters, I guess, you know, in the books is really important for me that I think to make sure that all the characters pull their weight with his story. So I really, you know, I don't have any characters who don't have a role, and they all have to be doing something and that's not going to be the same thing and some of them, you know, do more than others. But they all, they're all kind of there for a reason. And I mean, you know, George, you know, as you said, he, he's an outsider. And I think when you're writing about a small community, you have that mix of kind of insiders and outsiders. If you're talking purely from a plot point of view, because having people who have different, you know, connections and experiences and backgrounds of a town allow them to make different observations and notice different things and give the reader different information than they would if they all were coming at an event from the same point of view. So purely from a completely technical point of view, that is, you know, why someone like George would, you know, be created within the book. And then I guess from a creative point of view, you know, we've got a small, a small coastal town, you know, you want outsiders and outsiders to come in. And, you know, there's a few options for what that person could do and what could draw them there. But, you know, I felt like, you know, a writer looking for inspiration, especially when he, you know, has a bit of ties to the town himself for various reasons. It seemed like just a really sort of a really good opportunity just to add an extra kind of element to the book. You also have Kieran say, when he, when he sees Barlin, you have him say, you have him remembering that Barlin had, I want to get this right, had been on a panel with two women authors and spoken for easily half the time. Is this based on your experience too, that male authors dominate panels? Look, I've seen it happen more than once. It had to say it doesn't, I'm not, you know, I'm not sort of, it's not something that has happened to me sort of recently, you know, but I think anybody who's ever been to a festival has probably seen that happen from time to time. It was just a rather lovely little comment because when we go with, you do recognize what goes on. Now, let's go back to, you said at the start that you tend to start with the place or the setting. So you've answered, I had a question about where you start with plot character or the setting. And I just wondered with this novel, whether it was the storm that you started with the storm in your head, and the way the storm could have such an impact on so many people. No one had come through the storm unscathed. So did you begin with Tasmania and then the storm, or did you have the storm in your head as something that could have this ripple effect? Actually, probably neither really. So actually what I actually really start with is probably the end of the book. And when I say the setting, so I apologize, I probably wasn't clear actually with the setting. The setting comes really almost simultaneously with that. That's something I'm thinking about almost at the same time. But the plot is probably what comes first and then that that would then help, you know, give me a really clear idea quite early on of where the settings going to be. So they're kind of simultaneously. But in terms of the, the kind of core idea, when I'm thinking about a book and when I'm sort of trying to work out what I'm going to write about the thing I'm often thinking about really is the end of the book, what becomes the end of the book. And that is the kind of an event where people have been pushed into extreme circumstances. And, you know, and those circumstances can be so varied. I mean, it really does a, does a, that's, that's the question I'm sort of trying to answer when I'm, you know, planning a book, what, what has driven your people to this point where, you know, something extreme has happened between them. And that could be all kinds of things, you know, it could be something recent, it could be something that's been like long brewing. It could be, you know, sort of a set of circumstances. It could just be, you know, unlucky. So there's all kinds of ways you can get people to that point and I'm thinking about what's what is that extreme circumstance and what is their relationship and why they come to this. And then once I've kind of, that's sort of got an idea that kind of settles and feels like yes, this is, this is something that I can see has enough, you know, avenues and an opportunity to kind of build it up. And then I start thinking about, okay, so, so how, how do we get to this point and what characters do I need to, you know, kind of, you know, tell the story, you know, so you need the main character, and you'll that main character to have a family of some sort and they'll have, you know, they'll have friends and acquaintances and, you know, they might have a partner or they may not or children or they may not, you know, so you're sort of thinking about the whole kind of, you know, you know, this sort of cast that you need to kind of let the main character, I guess, go through that story in a way they need to. And then, you know, and then really one of the last things I'm sort of thinking about is where I'm going to start the book and where I kind of drop the reader into this, you know, this seed and this set of circumstances. So they drop in at a point that's going to grab them and is, is going to at that point kind of pull them all the way through to this endpoint and the whole book is kind of funneling towards this, this conclusion. And that's, that's kind of how I structure it. So in fact, every book you write you start with the end. Yeah, I do. Yeah. It's taking me, I probably only really realized that was, you know, that was the way I do it with the lost man. That was when it became really clear to me that was how my planning process was working. But that's, that's how I did it with all of them. You just, you know, when you, when you're starting, when you're starting out writing, you know, your, your kind of your techniques and your, you know, the way you kind of approach your novel isn't, you know, isn't as clear as it becomes the more novels you write. So, you know, a lot of the time, you know, you're kind of trying to work out how, you know, how, how your writing practice works. And it sort of has become place in increasing personally over the four books that when I plan and when I feel an idea settles, it's definitely those initial stages. It's actually the end points, which is what I'm looking at. So now I actively, now I actively think about the endpoint when I'm thinking about a new book. Well, that explains the drama, the drama of your conclusions. I mean, it really does. I mean, I'm so glad I asked that question because I don't think I've ever heard you say that before. So it's terrific. I think also just if anybody out there who might be writing the writing book, I think one of the real benefits of that as well is that you know that you know that the book will work because, you know, if you're writing, especially something with a bit of a mystery, you know, it's, I think it's really easy to kind of write yourself into a corner. If you, if you kind of start from the start, you have this great opening with this kind of event that you know, how can it possibly resolve yourself? Like, at some point, you have to resolve it. And, and I think, you know, we've all read books where I think it's become clear that the author has not been able to really resolve it satisfactorily. So, but if you if you start at the end and you think about the end point, everything you do builds around that. So every red herring and every twist and turn and all the characters and everything is kind of, is kind of, you know, manufacturing geared around this point. So you know, you know, you know, you can really do anything you want to around that, because you know that the ending will work. And that's why your novels are also like this, the sort of onion that you unpeel that you unpeel things and you come to this drama at the end, which is the center. And that's why it's so successful. Oh, thank you. It's honestly, it's a lot easier, I think to add in red herrings and, you know, distractions and things if you know where you're going with it because you can you can actually have a lot of fun with it and you can you can pick the most kind of gripping that you know you can you can you can you can be really like you have the whole luxury of thinking like, you know, you know, where, where in this whole characters lives and and the interactions, where am I going to start this book which is the most interesting part to, you know, to then, you know, draw through this conclusion that you, you know, you know you're working towards so, you know, it's, yeah, I personally find it a lot easier to kind of work it you know work it started the start of kind of hope it all works out at the end. And that explains the structure of the novel to when people pick it up they'll know what we're talking about. Before we go, we have to go to questions in a minute. We do have to ask you about the film, which with Eric banner, and I heard I listened to the launch, and I heard that you have a part in it too. So tell us when's it going to be released and about your role in this major motion. Yeah, so I believe. So I, so I believe it was pencil in for April next year, although I've actually said that James Bond film is now being rescheduled for April. So I think that might that might change matters a little bit because I'm not sure anybody really wants to go ahead with them as wonderful as the film is like I think you've changed bond might by dominating cinemas that week. So, but the film is done, it's completed it was filmed last year so 2019 in Northwest Victoria in a lot of like really small kind of your communities, which is great which is where kind of the fictional town in the dry was set. And I got invited to go up there and be an extra in the funeral and the wake scenes, which was really fun. So if you look at some of me, you have to look hard. I mean if that half a second that I've seen the second row of the funeral, and I'm holding a warm glass of white wine at the village hall for the wake so that was my kind of big acting moments. But you know it was amazing I got to meet a banner and I got to see them kind of filming it and meet all the cast and and then I got to see the finish film earlier this year. Luckily just before lockdown actually they showed showed it to me and you know it was it's really amazing it's such it's such a fantastic film and I'm so delighted because I think you know when you hand over your book to be made to a film. It's a real kind of leap of faith and you know I just I'm so blown away with what I've done with it. It's a really sort of beautiful thoughtful thrilling adaptation and I think they've captured all the high points and all the kind of emotion of the characters and the setting it's beautifully shot so well put together. So if it's in a pool whenever it comes out definitely if you join the book you definitely make it up to go see it because I think you'll really like it. That's great. I do hope James Stumb Bond doesn't hold it up. I mean people here would go to see it without without a blink but I presume they're looking at World Wide Release and James Bond so and actually I am going to go to questions but one more one more. Falk are you going to bring him back. Yeah, I will. I think I'll bring him back for certainly for one more. The only reason I really haven't done it in in the last couple of books is because like I was saying when I when I think when I think about a plot you know and and how it's going to work I think it's really obvious to me. You know if if if he didn't have a role in The Lost Man and The Survivors you know the characters just were not the right place for him and he would have been completely shoehorned in and so you know it's really important to have those those right characters but I do have I have kind of got a bit of a thought for him that I'm sort of well after I finished I'll sort of be is one of the things I'll be kind of deciding whether to develop or not like I've got a few ideas and sort of you know I'll be trying to decide which one you know I think you know is you know is worse sort of working up and I have got one which I think would work actually pretty well for him. So yeah so people with it is just it's just finding that kind of really you know that perfect opportunity for him. Good. So we have some questions from our from our virtual audience and this one is from Lorraine and she asks do you pick topical issues to build a story around and explore and you have got a few topical issues in here with dementia and PPS. I always get it wrong PSTD you have got they are topical. So do you do you look for them to include in your story. Yeah no thanks Lorraine no it's a good question and the answer is actually no not really. So I never I never set out to write about a certain theme and I don't really you know it's not something in my planning process is not really something that that I actually dedicate any real time to um what I what I always do is I focus first like I say on the plot and the characters and you know making sure the whole structure works and then what it is is really when I'm I'm starting to think about characters in more detail for a long time they're quite two dimensional and they're there to kind of fulfill a role. And then as part of the sort of process it comes to a point when I'm starting to kind of flesh them out. And I think a lot about their backgrounds and their relationships and what their lives are like. And it's really then I think the themes really start to develop because you know as part of building those characters in an authentic way you try to think about you know what issues are affecting them and what kind of things that you know troubling them or you know conversations they're having and I think part of being authentic is trying to capture those things that then become recognizable contemporary themes because as real people we do experience them and we talk about them and we read about them and they impact our lives to various degrees so that's so the themes are always driven by the characters. And I never I never sort of forced the characters to do anything to develop a theme. I always just try not to theme develop to whatever degree is going to based on what the characters need to do. But that's kind of because I just think that's a bit more natural than it feels you know better it's a better reading experience for the reader when things sort of are allowed to I think emerge rather than being deliberately kind of forced in. And this one this one is from Bernadette and she asks, what is it about the Australian landscape that inspired you. And I think, you know, look at me the Australian landscape is such a, you know, like it has so many opportunities for writers and I think, you know, when I first started to, you know, when I go back to when I first started writing the dry, you know, I just thought I'm going to write the kind of book that I would like to read and I thought, you know, I'd love to read something really set in kind of like a really, you know, strong Australian setting with these characters to kind of, you know, I guess recognizable and and I think, you know, it's like Australia is, I mean every country is unique to itself but Australia has such a kind of really diverse geography and and I think the geography often really drives the people, you know, so your lifestyle is quite heavily influenced by where you live, especially when we get outside of the urban areas. And so that was something that I just think really lends itself like very, very well to books that have a bit of kind of mystery and suspense and tension because often the landscape kind of has its own hazards and and that can really, you know, do like a lot of heavy lifting for for me in certain ways by just putting these characters into these landscapes that have a bit of, you know, brutality and danger to them. And that's why each of your books are so different to because the landscape is so different and produces such different reactions. And this is what she asks what inspires you to write. And I think you've answered that to the second part of the question which is where do you draw inspiration from. Yeah, so what inspires me to write I guess you know look I mean, you know, I guess, like I, you know, right now it's because I enjoy it. And I think the, you know, when I was, well, for each book I suppose it's a little bit different because it's always a different experience, you know, when I was running a dry, you know, I'd always been a big reader as a child and I'd love books and I, you know, I always loved reading and I always thought I'd love to write a book. I'd love to write a book that people love to read, you know, and that was kind of something that I've kind of carried with me for a lot of years and I'd never have done anything about it really so I was always working full time as a journalist and just felt sort of too busy and and I wasn't honestly sure how to start. But it got to the point I think where the fear of regrets became bigger than, you know, bigger than the fear of failure I suppose you know so I kind of thought I really want to give it a try because, you know, at least then I've, at least then I've tried and I've kind of achieved the thing I've been wanting to do for years and if it doesn't get published and nobody reads it. Like that's okay at least I've given it a shot, you know, so that was kind of, I guess the motivation for the dry and then, you know, you know, I really have, you know, sort of this amazing opportunity now to write more books and, you know, have contracts and I know that they're going to get published and, you know, so I think you're now I'm in a really fortunate position where, you know, it's because I really just love writing and I love to be able to kind of, you know, create stories that I do think that I would like to read. And, you know, in terms of the inspiration I think it's always, it's always different and I think often the inspiration for book sometimes by the time I've gone through the whole writing process is actually very different from maybe how the book turns out, because what I'm looking for in that moment of inspiration is the core of an idea that I think I can develop so I'm looking for the whole book I'm looking for, you know, any whole, you know, particular character or I'm not expecting the whole story to present itself I'm just looking for an idea that I think has enough opportunity that I can develop it so for any writers out there that's that's like a good place to start I think. And the last one we've got actually is from Trish and she's asking you, I think about the next book. Trish is asking you how do you think of the next book? How do you go, I presume it means how do you go about starting the next book? Yeah, so, so I'll be starting thinking about the next book quite soon. I tend to like one of the biggest things I think I've learned about the writing process is it's really important to take into stages and not necessarily try and rush any particular stage. So now the survivors have just come out and I've got a lot of kind of media and publicity and virtual tours and things to do. So, you know, I'm letting myself focus on that and, you know, enjoy the book coming out. And then when that dies down, then I'll start really thinking about the next book and what I'll do I'll spend a long time just thinking and weighing up kind of different ideas and trying to just find that that's sort of one kind of poor idea that settles. And I think it's really worth taking that time because, you know, there's a lot of a lot of time and wasted words, you know, if you kind of rush into an idea that's not that's not right and it can be for me it's quite false economy to do that so I think about the idea and then I'll start once I've set the last start to kind of do you like a little bit of, you know, a real skeleton outline so I'm talking maybe like five or 10 sentences kind of outlining where the main points of the book as I see them. And then I'll kind of expand those a little bit and I'll keep expanding them to say, you know, so 20 sentences then 20 paragraphs and I'll and I'll start kind of really trying to work out the order of the book and the characters and how it's going to play out and I'll spend a long time refining that, making sure the characters are right. Making sure I've got it, you know, you did setting and the get the timeline and all that kind of things as sort of as they get the best way they could be. And I don't actually start writing until I've really got everything I think structurally in the best place I can get it at that point. I'm pretty sure that's how the book is going to play out. Then I'll start writing. So I'll spend months and months writing and as long as I've done the plan well. You know, I can actually write the first draft pretty quickly because it then it's just about executing each of those scenes in the best possible way and making it interesting for the reader. And you actually said that for the last man you use Scrivener. Did you use that again. Do you find that a useful tool. Kind of yes and no I did. I did use it a bit because it has a quite useful kind of corkboard tool where you can sort of you can kind of nap out scenes on a, I guess like a virtual corkboard you can kind of move things around a little bit and see the whole book. You know, in order. And I think though, like, I find that program actually quite hard to use and I don't totally trust myself to completely like, you know, know the work is always fully saved and all that kind of thing. I think it has a lot of features that I don't use, but I do use that feature. Not to say, though, I think there's probably better ways there's probably better ways to do that in different programs and some people find it easy to do and maybe physically, you know, with actual pieces of paper on a corkboard, or in a word file. But my, my sort of technology is pretty kind of basic by choice, I think so I mean I just, you know, I just use normal word for a lot of my notes and, you know, I think the most important thing is to kind of have confidence you can find things when you need them. You have like, you know, you have a really good kind of filing system to save your various notes and drafts, and you know, back it up like that. That's, that's like a lot of a big part of writing I think is, is getting that admin stuff right and as boring as it sounds. You don't want to pour your heart and soul into, you know, something really, really creative only to lose it because you know your USB stick breaks or something like that. So do the boring admin stuff as well is a really key piece of advice for me. Be prepared and then write. Yeah. Well we've got about five minutes before we're due to finish so how about we just have one more question and then we'll finish. And I know before, but all of your heroes so far have been male. Is this conscious? Have you, have you ever thought about a female detective or a female man character who would work out what's going on? I mean, in this story, you've got Sue Penneberry, who's really quite a, she's a clever woman and she gets, she gets to what has happened. Did you ever think about writing it from her perspective rather than doing it from Kearance? Yeah, look, I mean, the choice of having all male characters so far has been a really conscious choice. And I mean, conscious in the sense that, you know, it's definitely something that I consider really closely. You know, I consider it closely for a few reasons, but not least because I have, you know, now I have a, I have a daughter and I have a son who one day will be old enough to read these books. And I ask myself, you know, what will I, what will I say, you know, if my daughter asked me exactly that question, like why, you know, why have you chosen male characters? And, you know, the answer, and I feel quite comfortable with the answer there and the answer is it's always plot driven. And part of that is, you know, it's part of the planning process. I'm always really thinking about who is going to provide the best overview and perspective of this story. And sometimes that's, and that is often like quite a technical question, because you need someone who has certain connections with the place and certain connections with, you know, the whole cast of characters can provide insight, can provide sort of some sort of fresh eyes. And also from a purely practical point of view can do things that sometimes the female characters can't I think cannot do naturally. So, for example, Kieran can go, Kieran can go walking through that town at night without a second thought. His, his, his partner, she can't. And so she, she is limited in some ways by her natural caution. It's sort of what she can, you know, what she would feel naturally comfortable doing as part of her character. So, so you need a character who has that kind of those options. And sometimes things like, for example, in the lost man, you know, the when I went up there and you know I spent a lot of time kind of speaking to people and say cattle stations about the makeup of those stations and, you know, I think it's really important to kind of reflect things like that, you know, in an authentic, genuine way as well so sometimes it's driven by the practicalities of the situation. And I said that I think absolutely like, I mean, I, you know, for sure, I think, you know, I will write female lead characters. It's, you know, there'll be stories that completely lend themselves to that and present themselves. So, you know, whatever have a story, I only really have one idea, one good idea at a time. And in all these cases, this has been the most practical way to do it. Yeah, I really look forward to kind of find, you know, those stories that, yeah, let me, let me, you know, explore other characters as well. Thank you, Jane, very much for your time tonight. It's been wonderful talking to you. It's been an absolute privilege. And thank you so much for coming. And just to remind people that the book is available at the ANU's Harry Hartog Bookshop. Oh, I'll have to buy it. It's a great read. Thank you very much. Thanks for coming as well. No, it's been a pleasure.