The opening chapters of one road trip and three novels are free to download in the hope of getting feedback to shape their First Editions. I’d love to hear what doesn’t work for you, what’s missing, what’s downright confusing, where you gave up, what’s wrong and where the plot-holes are.
A quest for this quintessentially antipodean family of birds uncovers the withering tree of life and the vanishing landscapes of Australia & New Zealand.
From the UK and a Singapore stopover the traveller journeys to a week around Perth. Then two months in a campervan from Adelaide to Cairns, Queensland. He learns how the tree of life connects the whole globe and how vulnerable it is to our human onslaught.
As if the natural world were fighting back, the route also skirts floods and cyclones. A fortnight in Tasmania and Victoria, with its fatal fires, concludes this far from straightforward quest for the 73 honeyeaters. Finally, New Zealand offers a coda with its own branch of the family.
It’s not just birds that fill out the story: it’s a last chance to witness other survivors from the Triassic before they succumb to this human-caused mass extinction. Cities, culture shock and vanilla tourist attractions also play cameo roles.
When Greg lands Jane as a new flatmate at the start of a bird flu epidemic, time could be short for them. Time certainly becomes scarcer for Greg’s GP pal, Hugo. From Bristol to Scotland, through Europe and even to Australia, pandemics cause a human dieback. Then the virus mutates to deliver a further blow. Greg, Jane and Hugo must redefine the meaning of their lives. Or have it defined for them.
From YouWriteOn: “…an original voice…” “Three good characters on which to base a strong story.” “…lucid and intelligent…”
These will hinder the boys’ attempt at seeing all 512 of the Brush Type 4 diesel locos. “Clearing” them. Can they fit it all in?
Forty years later Timothy casts a Proustian eye over the past and tries to cope with work and, still, birds – women and feathered ones.
These are the opening chapters. From YouWriteOn: “…intriguing… highly polished… it reads beautifully.” “…a waltz down memory lane.” “Novel, quirky and fun. I enjoyed this a lot.” “…many a chortle.”
It’s 2169 and a new Ice Age threatens civilisation. Ex-commodore Bonar Hall will provide the computer power for a twelve-year emigration to 18 Scorpii. Not everyone wants him to go: he has an expensive past. But Flight Pilot Heather Barnard is going. So too among the colonists is former model Aurora Nova. Bonar owes Heather; he doesn’t know Aurora, yet. All this may not matter if the emigration fleet doesn’t make it, and history is not on their side.
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